After several weeks of debate, EU member states were unsuccessful at supporting proposals aimed at temporarily banning international trade of bluefin tuna that environmentalists say is essential to preserving the species and allowing the depleted stocks to recover. Due to the high investment of certain Mediterranean countries in the bluefin tuna industry, however, the majority vote needed to adopt this measure fell just out of reach.
At the forefront of the original proposal was Monaco, the first country in the world to stop the sale of bluefin tuna, who was fervent on getting bluefin tuna listed as endangered under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES). The end effect would have been a temporary ban, for a period of two years, on all international trade of this species. However, several fisheries-dependent EU member states, including Spain, Malta, Italy, France, Greece, and Cyprus, were keen on ensuring that such legislation did not pass.
After undergoing two temporary bans on bluefin tuna trade in 2007 and 2008, Mediterranean countries seem apt to protect their fishing industries in which the sale of bluefin tuna – primarily to Japan where it is used to prepare high-quality sushi – is a significant source of income. They argued that a conservation ban would put too many jobs at risk, especially during a time of worldwide recession. Some conservationists claim that the countries opposed to this ban are more concerned about money than the preservation of a species.