Since the Mediterranean tuna fishing season opened at the beginning of May, over 10,000 breeding bluefin tunas are being caught every day by the industrial fishing fleet, according to WWF calculations.
This means over 27,000 tonnes of bluefin tuna will have been taken by the end of May – almost double the amount considered sustainable by international scientists, and already nudging the maximum catch of 29,500 tonnes allowed by law for the whole year, says the global conservation organisation.
WWF is urging the European Commission and Mediterranean countries to close the fishery immediately so that this fragile species has a chance to recover from the past years of unsustainable overexploitation.
According to the law, fishing by industrial fleets is allowed to continue until the end of June. By this time, WWF estimates that more than three times the sustainable level advised by scientists will have been fished according to WWF’s calculations on fleet capacity. Much of this would constitute illegal catch beyond official quotas and target what remains of the spawning fish, putting at risk the survival of the species.
“The bluefin tuna overexploitation is untenable and unjustifiable,” says Dr Sergi Tudela, Head of Fisheries at WWF Mediterranean. “Scientists are telling us the tuna stocks cannot support such high levels of catches, and pirate fishing has already been detected by WWF this year. Why is another disastrous fishing season being allowed to take place? This fishery must close now.”
According to scientists at the International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tunas (ICCAT, the body mandated to ensure the sustainable management of the Mediterranean bluefin tuna fishery), maximum catch should be of some 15,000 tonnes per year – less than what has already been caught in these first weeks of the fishing season.
Until sustainable management measures aligned with scientific advice are adopted – such as a closure of the fishing season in the crucial spawning month of June, and the reduction of fleet capacity – WWF continues to urge for a moratorium of the fishery by ICCAT Contracting Parties, and for the boycott of trade and consumption of Mediterranean bluefin tuna by citizens, retailers, chefs and restaurateurs across the world.
