January 31, 2018 — The federal government says the oceanic whitetip shark will be listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act to help the species recover.
Scientists say the sharks have declined by 80 percent to 90 percent in the Pacific Ocean since the 1990s. They’ve fallen 50 percent to 85 percent in the Atlantic Ocean since the 1950s.
Conservationists blame commercial fishing and demand for their fins.
Read the full story at the Gloucester Times
January 4, 2018 — Frigid temperatures may have transformed the waters off Cape Cod to ice, but it turns out the recent cold snap is not literally just freezing sharks to death.
It may, however, be contributing to the ocean predators getting trapped in Cape Cod Bay.
Greg Skomal, the senior fisheries scientist for the state Department of Fish and Game who leads the Massachusetts Shark Research program, said the thresher sharks — like the four that have been found dead in Wellfleet and Orleans in recent days — are dying as they attempt to swim to warmer southern waters but are getting stranded in shallow waters in Cape Cod Bay.
“The rapid cooling associated with this cold snap and water temps is forcing the sharks to move south at a faster pace, and the landmass of Cape Cod is contributing to them getting stranded in shallow water,” said Skomal, adding that the exact cause of the sharks’ deaths remains hypothetical at this time.
Cape Cod, with its shape of an outstretched human arm that hooks at Provincetown, can act as a natural trap for animals trying to move south quickly, and most shark species need to be continually moving in order to breathe effectively, he said.
Read the full story at the Boston Globe
November 30, 2017 — WASHINGTON — The following was released by the International Seafood Sustainability Foundation:
The International Seafood Sustainability Foundation (ISSF) has released its Update to ISSF Conservation Measures & Commitments Compliance Report, which shows a first-ever conformance rate of 100 percent by 28 ISSF participating companies with all 21 ISSF conservation measures in effect as of December 31, 2016. ISSF Participating Companies account for about approximately 75% of the global canned tuna market.
As part of its commitment to transparency and accountability, ISSF engages third-party auditor MRAG Americas to assess ISSF Participating Companies’ compliance with ISSF’s conservation measures according to a rigorous audit protocol.
The November 2017 Update is based on audits conducted from May–November 2017 on measures where some companies had “minor” or “major” nonconformance. Improvements noted since the May 2017 ISSF Conservation Measures & Commitment Compliance Report include:
§ MRAG’s new audit showed 28 companies have corrected all non-conformances to become fully compliant with all 21 measures audited, compared to 22 fully-compliant companies in the May 2017 report.
§ None of the companies had minor non-conformances, as compared with five that did in May 2017. MRAG’s May report also showed that six companies had at least one major non-conformance, with a total of 12 major non-conformances found. As of the November 2017 update, all major non-conformances had been remediated.
§ Participating companies were able to close their compliance gap in 2016, moving from 97.5 percent (May 2017 report) to 100 percent full conformance.
§ The rate of full conformance has increased steadily each reporting period:
§ June 2015: 79.8 percent
§ June 2016: 87.2 percent
§ October 2016: 95.6 percent
§ May 2017: 97.5 percent
§ November 2017: 100 percent
The ISSF Conservation Measures & Commitments Compliance Report is published annually to track ISSF participating companies’ progress in conforming with ISSF conservation measures like these:
§ Tracing tuna products by fishing and shipment vessels, fishing trip dates, fish species, ocean, and other factors
§ Establishing and publishing policies to prohibit shark finning and avoiding transactions with vessels that carry out shark finning
§ Conducting transactions only with purse seine vessels whose skippers have received science-based informationfrom ISSF on best practices such as reducing bycatch
§ Avoiding transactions with vessels that are on an RFMO Illegal, Unregulated and Unreported (IUU) Fishing list
ISSF adopts new conservation measures regularly; four new measures were adopted in 2017, for example.
In addition to the summary compliance reports, third-party independent auditor MRAG Americas issues individual ISSF participating company reports that document in detail their compliance with conservation measures. Last year marked the first time that ISSF started publishing the individual company compliance reports on its website.
“Transparency and independence in the auditing process create the foundation for accountability that make our conservation measures effective, and each company’s actions influence and raise the bar for the other industry players,” said ISSF President Susan Jackson. “These companies have come a long way in making sustainability a part of their business strategy. They’re helping to make sure that they’re not only following the conservation measures on a path of continuous improvement individually, but that the companies as a group are also setting the tone for the entire tuna industry.”
More Information about ISSF Conservation Measures & Compliance
For long-term tuna sustainability, a growing number of tuna companies worldwide are choosing to participate with ISSF, follow responsible fishing practices, and implement science-based conservation measures. From bycatch mitigation to product traceability, ISSF participating companies have committed to conforming to a set of conservation measures and other commitments designed to drive positive change—and to do so transparently through third-party audits.
View ISSF Conservation Measures
About the International Seafood Sustainability Foundation (ISSF)
The International Seafood Sustainability Foundation (ISSF) is a global coalition of scientists, the tuna industry and World Wildlife Fund (WWF) — the world’s leading conservation organization — promoting science-based initiatives for the long-term conservation and sustainable use of tuna stocks, reducing bycatch and promoting ecosystem health. To learn more, visit https://iss-foundation.org/, and follow ISSF on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram.
November 28, 2017 — The following was released by the International Seafood Sustainability Foundation:
Using data from Regional Fisheries Management Organizations (RFMOs), scientific observer programs, and its own at-sea research and skippers workshops, the International Seafood Sustainability Foundation (ISSF) has published an updated report that documents purse-seine tuna fishing’s impact on “non-target” species. The bycatch species covered in the report are sharks, whale sharks, rays, finfish, sea turtles, and billfish. While they are not bycatch species, the report also touches upon catches of undesirably small bigeye and yellowfin tunas.
Organized by species and including graphics and a full bibliography, “ISSF 2017-06: A Summary of Bycatch Issues and ISSF Mitigation Activities to Date in Purse Seine Fisheries, with Emphasis on FADs”:
“A Summary of Bycatch Issues” is intended to be a useful reference for fishers and tuna companies, scientists, regional fisheries management organizations (RFMOs), government agencies, nongovernment organizations (NGOs) including conservation groups, and others interested in helping fisheries to be more sustainable.
Report Data and Insights Can Guide Conservation Efforts
The November 2017 report, authored by ISSF staff and collaborating scientists Victor Restrepo, Laurent Dagorn, David Itano, Ana Justel-Rubio, Fabien Forget, and Gala Moreno, is an update of a 2014 publication.
Not all non-target species are equally vulnerable to becoming bycatch in purse-seine fisheries, and bycatch rates for a single species can vary across oceans. For some species, other fishing methods have higher bycatch than purse-seine fishing. Here are some key findings in the report:
ISSF on Bycatch Mitigation
Since its inception in 2009, ISSF has dedicated resources and efforts to understanding bycatch issues in tuna fisheries (see “Related ISSF Activities” sections in the report). In addition to publishing scientific reports, ISSF hosts bycatch-mitigation workshops and publishes guidebooks and videos for skippers and other stakeholders. The Foundation also advocates science-based, mitigation measures to RFMOs through meetings and side events, position statements, and joint letters.
Commercial vessels catch about 4.7 million tons of tuna annually. Purse-seine vessels dominate large-scale tuna fishing, harvesting about 64% of the tropical tuna catch (skipjack, yellowfin, and bigeye tuna). Many purse seiners use Fish Aggregating Devices (FADs) or other floating objects to attract tuna to their nets, although they also may pursue sets on free-swimming tuna schools. More than half of the total tropical tuna landings globally are made by sets on FADs or other floating objects.
Bycatch occurs across most major tuna fishing methods — including longline, gillnet, and troll — and all fishing methods can affect the marine environment in multiple ways beyond bycatch.
“ISSF 2017-06: A Summary of Bycatch Issues and ISSF Mitigation Activities to Date in Purse Seine Fisheries, with Emphasis on FADs” can be downloaded from the ISSF site.
For more information on tuna stock health, see ISSF’s Status of the Stocks. For more information on FAD fishing and bycatch, see ISSF’s Questions and Answers about FADs and Bycatch.
November 14, 2017 — WASHINGTON — The following was released by the International Seafood Sustainability Foundation:
The International Seafood Sustainability Foundation (ISSF) has released its position statement in advance of the 25th Regular Meeting of the International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tunas (ICCAT) in Marrakech, Morocco, on 14-22 November 2017.
“ICCAT made substantial headway last year by agreeing to maintain total allowable catch levels for yellowfin and bigeye tuna stocks, which have experienced overfishing in recent years,” said ISSF President Susan Jackson. “But ICCAT’s science committee estimates that catch limits for bigeye and yellowfin were still exceeded in 2017, by 11 percent and 16 percent, respectively. The situation must be addressed.”
ISSF is asking that ICCAT adopt stock-specific measures in line with its science committee’s advice and that it allocate the yellowfin catch limit by gear type so that ICCAT member countries can know their individual limits. ICCAT must also ensure that fishing capacity of purse seine fleets is in line with catch limits and adopt in-season catch monitoring to avoid exceeding those limits.
FAD Management
ISSF also asks that ICCAT immediately address persistent gaps in FAD data reporting and ensure that requirements for non-entangling FADs are met. Further, ICCAT should implement its FAD Working Group recommendation to extend 100 percent observer coverage on large-scale purse seine vessels to the entire year.
“FAD sets account for nearly 50 percent of tropical tuna catches in the Atlantic Ocean,” Jackson continued. “We have to improve the monitoring and management of FAD usage in all ocean regions, and that starts with RFMO contracting parties complying with required data reporting. ICCAT scientists cannot effectively analyze and provide management recommendations on FADs without access to the best information.”
Longline Observer Coverage
Troublesome data gaps also persist for the longline sector. ICCAT scientists have highlighted that the current 5% observer coverage requirement is inadequate to provide reasonable estimates of total bycatch. And data on observer coverage in longline fisheries indicates some fleets are not meeting even this 5% mandatory minimum. This lack of data on longline catches and interactions with non-target species hinders scientific input on effective conservation measures. It must be rectified.
ISSF urges ICCAT to implement its scientific staff’s recommendation to increase the minimum level of observer coverage to 20% for longline fleets, and other major gears. At the same time, ICCAT must strengthen compliance by identifying and sanctioning non-compliance through its Compliance Committee. ISSF is also recommends that ICCAT develop binding measures to ensure the safety of human observers.
Other priority improvements in the ISSF position statement include:
§ Adoption of interim Harvest Control Rules (HCRs) for North Atlantic Albacore that have been tested by the science committee and execution of an independent peer review of the management strategy evaluations set in place last year.
§ Adoption of measures to strengthen the region’s existing shark finning measures and reduce catches of northern shortfin mako sharks, and require that accurate data are collected and submitted on catches of all oceanic sharks.
§ Development of E-monitoring and E-reporting standards for longline vessels, as soon as possible.
§ Adoption of further amendments to modernize the ICCAT VMS measure and bring it in line with global best practices.
Read the full position statement in English, French or Spanish.
About the International Seafood Sustainability Foundation (ISSF)
The International Seafood Sustainability Foundation (ISSF) is a global coalition of scientists, the tuna industry and World Wildlife Fund (WWF) — the world’s leading conservation organization — promoting science-based initiatives for the long-term conservation and sustainable use of tuna stocks, reducing bycatch and promoting ecosystem health. To learn more, visit https://iss-foundation.org/, and follow ISSF on Twitter,Facebook and Instagram.
November 2, 2017 — WASHINGTON — The following was released by the office of Congressman Walter Jones:
Congressman Walter B. Jones (NC-3) is moving to help Eastern North Carolina fishermen who could be hurt by legislation pending before Congress. The bills threaten America’s domestic shark fisheries, and a significant piece of those fisheries is in Eastern North Carolina. They are sustainably managed and help support the economy in coastal North Carolina and other small fishing communities around the country.
The bills – H.R. 1456 and S. 793 – purport to be an attempt to stop the practice of shark finning (i.e. the process of removing fins at sea and discarding the shark). They seek to do so by banning the sale of fins, even those harvested legally here in the United States. However well-intentioned the bill sponsors may be, the fact is that shark finning has been illegal in the United States for many years. Advocates for the legislation have countered with the false allegation that the practice is still widespread. They publicly claimed that NOAA Fisheries had 500 cases of shark finning over the last several years. That number sounded impossibly high to Congressman Jones, so in August he asked NOAA Fisheries for the real number of federal shark finning violations assessed over the past five years. According to NOAA, the real number is not 500, it is 22. The Associated Press recently ran a story correcting the record on the ‘fake news’ claims distributed by the bill’s supporters. You can find that story HERE.
“If foreign countries are failing to manage their shark populations appropriately, they should change their ways,” said Congressman Jones. “But we should not put U.S. fishermen out of business in the process.”
This week, Congressman Jones urged U.S. Secretary of Commerce Wilbur Ross to join him in opposing the legislation. The Commerce Department is home to the regulatory agency – NOAA Fisheries – which manages the domestic shark fisheries. As Congressman Jones pointed out to Secretary Ross in a letter, federal law mandates that the domestic shark fishery be managed sustainably. According to renowned shark scientist, Dr. Robert E. Heuter of Florida’s Mote Marine Lab, America has “one of the best systems in the world for shark fisheries management and conservation.” The proof can be seen in NOAA Fisheries own data. NOAA Fisheries’ 2015 coastal shark survey captured and tagged “more than 2,800 sharks, the most in the survey’s 29-year history.” The leader of the survey stated that NOAA Fisheries has “seen an increase in the number of sharks in every survey since 2001,” and the agency called the survey results “very good news for shark populations.”
“Mr. Secretary, you know how important good jobs are to America’s future,” said Congressman Jones. “The sustainably managed U.S. shark fishery helps many hard working people in Eastern North Carolina and across the country support their families and their communities. For the sake of the American fishermen who make this country great, I respectfully ask you to oppose these bills.”
Congressman Jones has long been a strong supporter and advocate for Eastern North Carolina fishermen.
Additional information on Jones’ backing of North Carolina fishermen can be found here.
October 27, 2017 — A federal agency said on Thursday that it made a mistake with a key piece of data it gave to U.S. Sen. Cory Booker as he was building a case to shut down America’s shark fin trade.
Booker, a New Jersey Democrat, has cited more than 500 incidents involving complaints of shark finning in the U.S., dating back to January 2010, as cause to support shutting down the trade. But the number is actually 85.
Booker reached out to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration months ago to find out how often it investigates allegations of shark finning, an illegal practice in which a shark’s fins are removed and the shark is dumped back into the water, sometimes while it’s still alive.
An NOAA worker’s error involving a new case management system caused the mistake in the number of finning incident reports, said Casey Brennan, chief of staff for the NOAA’s Office of Law Enforcement. He said the number of reports that led to charges was 26.
Saving Seafood, a fishing industry trade group, asked the NOAA to clarify the figures about shark finning incidents after seeing conflicting data on the agency’s website.
“Shark finning is a reprehensible activity that has been outlawed in the U.S. and is opposed by participants in the sustainable U.S. shark fishery,” said Robert Vanasse, executive director of the group. “Members of our coalition do not believe there is any need for Booker’s bill.”
Read the full story from the Associated Press at the Washington Post
October 26, 2017 (Saving Seafood) — The horrific practice of shark finning has been illegal in U.S. waters since 2000, and is vehemently opposed by all U.S. shark fisheries and participants in those fisheries. The Office of Law Enforcement at NOAA Fisheries is enforcing the current finning prohibition; US fishermen are in full compliance with the law. There are very few incidents of this terrible practice on record in the United States.
On August 1, 2017, U.S. Senator Dan Sullivan (R-Alaska) chaired a hearing of the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Subcommittee on Oceans, Atmosphere, Fisheries, & Coast Guard regarding the reauthorization of the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act (MSA). During the hearing, Senator Cory Booker (D-New Jersey) asked Chris Oliver, NOAA Assistant Administrator for Fisheries and head of the National Marine Fisheries Service, to keep him informed on NOAA investigations of shark finning allegations. Sen. Booker introduced a bill earlier this year designed to prevent people from possessing or selling shark fins in America.
Leading up to his question, Senator Booker stated the following. “You know that shark finning was first outlawed in U.S. waters in 2000. And a loophole in that original law was closed by the Shark Conservation Act of 2009. I recently asked your office how many shark-finning investigations NOAA has opened since January 1, 2010. I was shocked to find out that since 2010, NOAA has investigated over 500 incidences of alleged shark finning. As of April, there were seven shark finning cases that were open but not yet charged.”
Sen. Booker’s statement, that NOAA advised him of over 500 instances of alleged shark finning immediately sparked incredulity in the commercial fishing industry, because in June 2016, in an article by Ally Rogers, a communications specialist for NOAA’s Office of Law Enforcement (OLE), entitled OLE Working Hard To Identify, Prevent Incidents of Shark Finning, Illegal Shark Fishing, NOAA stated that during the ten year period from 2006-2016, 40% of the “nearly 80 shark-related incidents” referred to “fins that were not naturally attached to the shark carcasses.” That works out to fewer than 32 incidents involving shark fins in a decade, or on average no more than 3.16 per year.
Saving Seafood asked NOAA how it could be that the agency told Senator Booker that they had “investigated over 500 incidences of alleged shark finning” in the past 7.5 years.
While the information NOAA provided in response to Senator Booker’s staff was not entirely inaccurate, a footnote was attached to the wrong sentence, making it possible for a reader to misinterpret the over-inclusive information provided.
In the NOAA case management system, there were 526 reports that contained the word “shark” in some form or another. This could include a number of legal and illegal activities including inspections, boardings, a legal or illegal take of a shark, by-catch, harvesting sharks during a closed season, and unpermitted shark fishing activities, to name a few. Any report that came into NOAA with the word “shark” in it, would have appeared as an incident in the numbers provided to Senator Booker.
In fact, of those 526 reports, only 85 were incidents that referred to “shark fins” or “shark finning”. Of those 85 incidents, only 26 resulted in charges that could be a criminal complaint, a summary settlement, a written warning, or a Notice of Violation and Assessment (NOVA). So, in the past 7.5 years, with an annual average of 2.6 million pounds landed sustainably from Federally managed shark fisheries, there has been on average just 3.5 incidents per year resulting in charges. And that is consistent with the earlier data.
In 2016, just ahead of the Discovery Channel’s “Shark Week,” Senator Booker, and House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Ed Royce (R-California) joined with actor Morgan Freeman and the environmental group Oceana to introduce the Shark Fin Trade Elimination Act (S. 793/H.R. 1456, in the current Congress). The ban is opposed by leading shark scientists David Shiffman of Simon Fraser University in British Columbia and Robert Hueter, Director of the Center for Shark Research at Mote Marine Laboratory in Sarasota, Florida. Delegate Gregorio Kilili Camacho Sablan (I- Northern Mariana Islands), and Senator Shelley Moore Capito (R-West Virginia) are also original co-sponsors.
Oceana, the Humane Society International, Wild Aid, and COARE have used the inaccurate information in support of the shark fin ban, erroneously arguing that even “in U.S. waters, our anti-finning law does not effectively stop shark finning.” In a recent blog post, Lora Snyder, Campaign Director at Oceana, Iris Ho, Wildlife Program Manager at Humane Society International, Peter Knights, Executive Director at WildAid and Christopher Chin, Executive Director at COARE, reference “government records cited during recent Congressional testimony” to make the claim that “more than 500 alleged shark finning incidents… have taken place in U.S. waters since January 2010.” They go on to extrapolate from that number, stating “That is approximately five cases every month.”
In fact, over the past decade, there have been fewer than four incidents per year.
Oceana hired The McGrath Group, headed by six-term former Congressman and President of the National Republican Club Ray McGrath to lobby for the bills, spending $20,000 with the GOP firm between July 1 and Sept 31 this year.
October 19, 2017 — PORTLAND, Maine — Fishermen will be allowed to catch slightly less of a species of shark that has become a more frequent target of commercial harvesting in recent years.
The Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission has approved a quota of about 38.2 million pounds of spiny dogfish for the 2018 fishing year, which starts May 1. That is about 900,000 pounds less than the quota for the current year.
It’s also more than dogfish harvesters usually catch, though they’ve been catching more recently.
Read the full story from the Associated Press at the Virginian-Pilot
October 12, 2017 — Meet Mark Twinam of St. Petersburg, Florida, who fishes from Madeira Beach for large coastal sharks such as hammerhead, lemon and bull sharks in the Gulf of Mexico. He’s part of a group of fishermen who help NOAA research sharks in exchange for landing and selling a small quota of sandbar sharks. Twinam fishes from his 40-foot single-engine boat, the Captain Tate, named for his son, who he proudly says is getting a doctorate in economics although he fished with Twinam as a boy. “I pretty much cured him of fishing. He decided schoolwork wasn’t so bad.”
How did you get into shark fishing?
I started fishing after high school, went grouper fishing, then fished with longlines for tuna and swordfish. There was a bycatch (unintentional catch) of sharks, and we thought we’d like to sell them. We caught some sharks off Tampa Bay in the 1980s and that was around the time the government was encouraging fishermen to go shark fishing. I’ve been doing it off and on ever since.
How is the shark fishing business these days?
Practically nonexistent. The fishing effort today is not even five percent of what it was in the 1980s. The quotas are strict, not many people participate although we’re filling the quota. Then there’s the research fishery. These are the only fishermen allowed to land sandbar sharks. I’m involved with the research. We take an observer on our boat; they count sharks, measure them, and collect other biological information. We get paid by selling the sharks we catch.
What are the major challenges in the shark fishing business?
The biggest challenge is the propaganda from environmentalists who say that everyone in the world is cutting the fins off and throwing the sharks back alive. This is not what we’re doing in the U.S. We follow the law, land sharks with fins attached, and sell both meat and fins. This year, we’ve had a tremendous challenge because environmentalists persuaded the California Legislature to ban the buying, selling and trading of shark fins. California was our biggest market for fins and a connection to the Hong Kong market. Now the price, if you can sell them, has dropped from $32 per pound to $14.