Saving Seafood

China is trying to rein in its vessels illegally depleting fish stocks in West Africa

March 15, 2018 — China is increasingly cracking down on vessels from its country that are engaged in illegal fishing activities in West Africa. It’s a move environmental groups say is indicative of increased intolerance towards illicit practices in high seas and an effort to improve its image globally.

Since 2016, the country has canceled subsidies worth €90 million ($111.6 million) for 264 vessels caught undertaking illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing, according to non-profit Greenpeace. Three of the 78 companies that owned these vessels had their distant water fishing licenses revoked, while 15 company owners and captains were blacklisted.

In late February, the ministry of agriculture also halted the pelagic fishing license of Lian Run, a major Chinese company accused of systematic pillaging of West African fisheries on a huge scale. All of the company’s distant water fishing operations, involving about 30 vessels, were also stopped. Last year, two of the company’s trawlers—Lian Run 34 and 47—were caught operating off the coast of Guinea with illegal fishing nets and in possession of shark fins without the body, a practice prohibited under Guinean law.

China also halted the operations of Fuzhou Honglong fisheries companies, months after the company was caught in the Galapagos Marine Reserve transporting thousands of dead shark carcasses.

Read the full story at Quartz 

 

U.S. fisheries’ leader Oliver asserts ‘business-minded’ stance at Boston 2018

March 13, 2018 — BOSTON — The US’ top regulatory authority on fishing used his first appearance ever at a Seafood Expo North America (SENA) conference on Sunday to describe how he was reshaping the mission at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) to create more of a pro-business environment.

Commercial fishermen largely applauded the Donald Trump administration’s selection of Chris Oliver to serve as NOAA’s assistant administrator of fisheries in June 2017. But Oliver, who was confirmed in his new role in July, has maintained a relatively low profile since, his office not responding to requests for interviews.

In November, he told Alaska fishermen at a public meeting that he supported regulatory flexibility. The month before he had demanded the retraction of an article suggesting US seafood exported to Japan includes a high number of illegal unreported and unregulated (IUU) fish.

On Sunday, in Boston, he made it clear that he was using his leadership role to both follow the administration’s charge to combat excessive regulation and also looking out for harvesters.

“I’m a firm believer in a science-based approach to fisheries,” Oliver said. “… For 40 years, the North Pacific [Management] Council has been using annual catch limits, and I firmly believe those are the cornerstone to sustainable management. But I also believe that there is room for flexibility and a greater role for common sense frankly in our approach to fisheries management. And I want to bring a more business-minded approach to that process.”

Read the full story at Undercurrent News

 

Fishing Boats ‘Going Dark’ Raise Suspicion Of Illegal Catches, Report Says

March 12, 2018 — A new report raises concerns that when fishing vessels “go dark” by switching off electronic tracking devices, in many cases they are doing so to mask the taking of illegal catches in protected marine parks and restricted national waters.

In the report released Monday by Oceana, an international conservation group, authors Lacey Malarky and Beth Lowell document incidents of fishing vessels that disappear from computer screens as they shut off collision-avoidance beacons near restricted areas, only to have them reappear days or weeks later back in legal fishing grounds.

“This practice of vessels going dark is really widespread on a global scale,” Malarky tells NPR.

Malarky and Lowell used Global Fishing Watch, which aggregates automatic identification system, or AIS, signals to give an unprecedented view of global fishing activity. AIS signals can be viewed by the public through such websites as Vesselfinder.com.

Yet another system, known as Vessel Management System, or VMS, is not available to the public but is used by countries to monitor their fishing fleets. However, “some countries can’t afford it — developing countries like those in West Africa,” Malarky says. “So, a lot of developing countries rely on AIS to monitor their fishing fleet.”

Read the full story at NPR

 

New Zealand Moves to Compensate Slave-Like Fishermen

March 12, 2018 — New Zealand lawyer Karen Harding has secured the first stage of review of existing New Zealand legislation to improve the working conditions of fishermen.

In particular, the move has given a lifeline to a group of Indonesian fishermen seeking compensation against their former South Korean employers for unpaid wages and slave-like treatment. The men reportedly worked up to 24 hour shifts with few breaks. They were forced to live in cockroach-riddled spaces, sleep in wet bedding and eat flea-ridden food, reports Radio New Zealand.

The Supreme Court has ruled that the men can claim proceeds from the sale of vessels seized by the government. The issues of the case required the Supreme Court to consider the relationship between the provisions of two separate pieces of legislation, the Fisheries Act and the Admiralty Act.

Harding has worked on the men’s case for several years without payment. “They were promised what were said to be good jobs, to come to New Zealand on work permits to work on these Korean fishing vessels. They came and they got raped, they got abused, they got molested, they had insects in their food, their rooms were full of cockroaches and mice.

Read the full story at the Maritime Executive

 

Albertsons adds seafood traceability monitoring

March 8, 2018 — Albertsons Companies, which operates more than 2,300 grocery stores in the United States, has selected Trace Register to trace its seafood products.

Trace Register’s TR+ Analytics with CMCA (continuous monitoring continuous auditing) will enable Albertsons Companies to meet sustainability specifications in the seafood supply chain on every shipment, according to Albertsons.

“Trace Register’s leading-edge monitoring and analytics will help track the movement of our products from the oceans or farm all the way to our U.S. distribution centers so we can verify that our requirements for sustainable, responsible sourcing are met,” said Anthony Snow, director of seafood for Albertsons Companies.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

 

Coast Guard risks rough seas stopping red snapper poachers

March 2, 2018 — SOUTH PADRE ISLAND, Texas — A small but swift U.S. Coast Guard patrol boat bounced violently over the choppy Gulf of Mexico last week, becoming airborne more than once before the chief ordered the pilot to slow down.

Five-foot waves and constant swell are typical February conditions at the U.S.-Mexico maritime boundary — even pleasant compared to other days the armed and ready crew members search for Mexican fishermen poaching in U.S. waters.

Four or five men in a simple Mexican watercraft, or “lancha,” can easily take tens of thousands of dollars in fish on a single run. The boats don’t look like much — rickety white fiberglass hulls with no steering wheels, powered by standard Yamaha outboard motors, equipped with simple fishing gear and rusting navigational equipment. But Mexican poachers are mostly winning the cat-and-mouse game, slipping through the violent chop and back into Mexico’s territorial seas, coolers laden with fish.

Their goal is one of the most popular commercial and recreational fish species in the Gulf today: red snapper.

“Almost exclusively what we’re seeing being targeted is red snapper,” said Capt. Tony Hahn, commander of the Coast Guard regional crew out of Corpus Christi, Texas. “Where they’re going and the reefs they’re fishing in are definitely populated by red snapper, which aren’t migratory. They’re hitting places where they know they’re going to catch red snapper, and that’s what we’re seeing from their catch.”

The U.S. has protested to the Mexico government, but the response has been lacking. Last year, NOAA decertified Mexico under compliance rules aimed at tackling illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing. The decertification means that no Mexican fishing vessel can enter any U.S. port, accept under exceptional circumstances and only with the Coast Guard’s approval.

Several million dollars’ worth of red snapper have already been stolen from U.S. waters by Mexican fisherman. As the problem persists and may worsen, NOAA may go even further next year. An officer with NOAA’s enforcement division says the next step could entail restrictions or an outright ban on imports of fish from Mexico.

Read the full story at E&E News

 

Slavery risk warning over UK’s scallop fisheries

Register singles out industry with retailers told to check suppliers are clear of any link to bonded labour

February 2, 2018 — Marine conservation campaigners have warned there is a critical risk that slaves are being used on British scallop fishing boats, and urged retailers to be on their guard.

A new slavery risk register published in the US on Thursday has singled out the UK’s queen and giant scallops fisheries as the most at risk of modern slavery after a Guardian investigation found allegations of bonded labour in the industry.

Nine African and Asian crew were taken off a pair of British scallop trawlers in Portsmouth in December as suspected victims of modern slavery, and two skippers, one from Scotland and the second from Merseyside, were detained by police.

The register, compiled by Monterey Bay Aquarium – one of the most prominent conservation campaigns in the US – the anti-slavery group Liberty Asia and the Sustainable Fisheries Partnership, also cites other alleged cases of suspected slavery involving migrant labour in Scotland and southern England in 2017, 2014 and 2012.

Read the full story at the Guardian

 

Report: Illegal Fishing Should be Major National Security Issue

November 17, 2017 — Illegal and unregulated fishing supports transnational crime, piracy, insurgency and terrorism and should be treated as a national security issue, a new report from the National Geographic Society and the Center for Strategic and International Studies says.

Although illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing provide pathways for a host of criminal activities, “it doesn’t have the consciousness of government imagination” not only in the United States but globally, John Hamre, CSIS chief executive officer said on Wednesday.

Active enforcement of exclusive economic zones and protected maritime areas is “largely the Wild West” in legal terms because one nation’s laws differ from another, said Gregory Poling, one of the report’s authors. Nations have not agreed-upon definitions of what is permitted even in protected maritime areas.

Transnational criminal networks become involved through the use of large fishing vessels staying at sea for a year or more, said Daniel Myers, of the National Geographic Pristine Seas project. In reality, “You have slave labor” working on these ships. Often a two-step “trans-shipping” system is used. In the first step, the smaller boats unload illegal catches onto a large mother ship. The mother ship, in turn, refuels and resupplies the smaller fishing vessels, allowing them to remain out from port for months and keep the crews working, often against their will.

Additionally, “you have illegal fishing boats used as cover for narco-trafficking,” Myers said. The stomachs of illegally-captured sharks or other fish are filled with cocaine. The results are profits from the illegal catch and the drug smuggling.

Read the full story at USNI News

NOAA’s Chris Oliver demands retraction of scientific paper alleging high levels of IUU fishing in Alaska

October 20, 2017 — National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Assistant Administrator for Fisheries Chris Oliver has called for the retraction of a scientific paper that draws the conclusion that illegal and unreported seafood caught in the United States is entering the Japanese market.

The paper, “Estimates of illegal and unreported seafood imports to Japan,” was published in Marine Policy, a scientific journal covering ocean policy. The paper made estimates that between 10 and 20 percent of Alaska pollock, salmon, and crab being exported to Japanese markets comes from illegal, unreported, and unregulated (IUU) fishing.

In a letter to Marine Policy Editor-in-Chief Hance Smith, Oliver questioned the methodology of the study and asked for an immediate retraction.

“While NOAA’s National Marine Fisheries Service generally agrees with the value of catch documentation and traceability as one of many tools available to combat IUU fishing, it strongly objects to authors’ claims regarding U.S. seafood exports to Japan and doubts the validity of the methodology used to makes such estimates,” Oliver wrote. “The allegations made in the paper absent any transparency regarding the data and assumptions supporting them are irresponsible and call into question the authors’ conclusions. Without significantly more information and transparency regarding data sources and methodologies applied, the paper should be retracted in its entirety.”

Read the full story at Seafood Source

 

NOAA defends U.S. Fisheries

October 17, 2017 — This week, NOAA Fisheries Assistant Administrator, Chris Oliver, sent a letter to the editor of Marine Policy that does not mince words. In response to a new report on IUU fishing, Mr. Oliver asks the editor, “to publish a retraction, and to ensure future articles undergo adequate review to avoid publication of misleading information.”

The article in question, “Estimates of illegal and unreported seafood imports to Japan,” claims a portion of IUU seafood coming to Japan include salmon, crab, and Alaska pollock from the United States. However, these three species in particular are considered among the best managed and most closely monitored in the world. (Not to mention, they’re healthy).

A flawed methodology

Mr. Oliver calls the allegations absent of any transparency regarding the data sources and methodology used by the authors to come up with these claims. The letter goes into more detail about data and methodology concerns and then provides ample information about the robust management of U.S. Alaska pollock, salmon, and crab fisheries.

Read the full story at the National Fisheries Institute

Read the letter from Chris Oliver to Marine Policy at NOAA