August 16, 2023 — NOAA Fisheries has awarded FLOAT Partners a five-year, USD 50 million (EUR 46 million) contract to oversee efforts to put observers on commercial fishing vessels in the Pacific Islands.
Under the contract, which is set to begin 1 September and continue into 2028, Hawai’i, U.S.A.-based FLOAT will recruit, supervise, and outfit fisheries observers as part of the Pacific Islands Region Observer Program (PIROP).
May 23, 2023 — Simi Cagilaba could hear the fighting outside his cabin door. In the hallway of the 209-foot tuna seiner, drunken crewmen were roiling the ship yet again. It was late, and the vessel was bobbing on the currents of the South Pacific, the fighting typical of nights when the cook let the crew drink the rice wine. Now, the unwelcome clamor moved toward his door like another bad omen in a trip that was steadily devolving.
An official observer of marine fisheries, Cagilaba was miles offshore of the Marshall Islands, dispatched aboard the seiner then known as the Sea Quest. It was 2015. He had a background in marine affairs and was working for the Fijian government in its national Ministry of Fisheries, tasked with upholding a patchwork of regulations meant to safeguard tuna.
December 7, 2021 — Tropical tuna in the eastern Pacific Ocean gained renewed protections and science-based catch levels under resolutions advocated by the United States. They were adopted by the Inter-American Tropical Tuna Commission at its virtual meeting in October. The IATTC also established a framework for foreign fishing vessels to face spot inspections when they enter the port of another member nation.
The IATTC’s actions will help conserve and sustainably manage tuna and other highly migratory species that cross international boundaries. They also improve oversight of international fisheries to reduce illegal, unreported, and unregulated fishing, a U.S. priority. The move furthers the effort to close the world’s ports to illegal fishing and give consumers additional confidence that their seafood is safe and sustainable.
“This is a critical step forward for the conservation of species that support important commercial fisheries and play a prominent role in the marine ecosystem,” said Ryan Wulff, who leads the U.S. delegation to the IATTC, and serves as Assistant Regional Administrator for Sustainable Fisheries for NOAA Fisheries’ West Coast Region. “We worked through challenging negotiations—all in a virtual setting. In the end, we achieved consensus on a number of important conservation and management measures for the eastern Pacific Ocean.”
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