Ninety-seven percent of the world’s total commercial tuna catch now comes from stocks at “healthy” abundance levels, according to the latest “Status of the Stocks” report from the International Seafood Sustainability Foundation (ISSF).

ISSF tuna

ISSF tuna

ISSF publishes its signature Status of the Stocks report several times yearly using the most current scientific data on 23 major commercial tuna stocks

At the same time, nearly 100% of the global tuna catch comes from stocks not experiencing overfishing. ISSF says this indicates that tuna fisheries are not only biologically healthy but also being harvested at sustainable levels.

Both figures represent the highest levels ever reported by ISSF.

“These results did not happen by chance,” ISSF Vice President of Science and Chair of the ISSF Scientific Advisory Committee Victor Restrepo said. “They reflect many years of sustained investment in science-based fisheries management – including improved data, stock assessments methods, and management frameworks – the adoption of harvest strategies, and stronger oversight by tuna regional fisheries management organisations.”

Restrepo noted that when ISSF began reporting these metrics in 2011, only 70% of the global tuna catch came from stocks at healthy abundance levels, and just 71% came from stocks not experiencing overfishing.

“The progress we see today is the result of long-term, coordinated efforts,” he said

Several stocks showed measurable progress in abundance or spawning biomass:

  • Atlantic Ocean bigeye: improved from yellow to green
  • Indian Ocean bigeye: improved from orange to yellow
  • Pacific Ocean bluefin: improved from orange to yellow
  • Indian Ocean yellowfin: improved from yellow to green

The change in exploitation rate or fishing mortality is limited to Indian Ocean bigeye, improving from orange to green.

Other key statistics in the new Status of the Stocks report include:

  • Globally, 74% of the 23 stocks are at a healthy level of abundance—up nine percentage points since the March 2025 report. No stocks are overfished, and 26% remain at intermediate levels
  • 96% of the 23 stocks are not experiencing overfishing – an improvement of five percentage points from the March 2025 report. None are experiencing overfishing and about 4% are at an intermediate level—unchanged since March 2025
  • About 52% of the global tuna catch now comes from stocks with adopted harvest strategies
  • 66% of the catch is made by purse seining, followed by longline (9%), pole-and-line (7%), gillnets (3%) and miscellaneous gears (15%)
  • 58% of the catch corresponds to skipjack tuna, followed by yellowfin (30%), bigeye (7%), and albacore (4%). Bluefin tunas account for 1% of the global catch
  • The five largest catches in tonnes (all unchanged since the previous report) are Western Pacific Ocean skipjack, Western Pacific Ocean yellowfin, Eastern Pacific Ocean skipjack, Indian Ocean skipjack and Indian Ocean yellowfin
  • The global catch of albacore, bigeye, bluefin, skipjack and yellowfin was 5.8 million tonnes in 2024, an 11% increase from 2023 levels

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