More than 100 participants from the Asia-Pacific region recently discussed the importance of applying seafood traceability as a way of fighting Illegal, Unreported and Unregulated (IUU) fishing.
The challenge of IUU was discussed at the opening of the second Coral Triangle Fishers Forum. Illegal fishing puts million of tonnes of fish stocks and millions of lives within the Coral Triangle (Indonesia, Malaysia, Papua New Guinea, Philippines, Solomon Island and Timor Leste) and the Pacific region at risk.
Marine Stewardship Council Pacific Fisheries manager, Bill Holden, said: “The ultimate deterrence to stop fishers engaging in IUU practices is if they have no markets to sell their catch to.”
The millions of tonnes of fish stock within the Asia-Pacific region represent more than 60% of global marine capture production.
WWF South Pacific Programme representative, Kesaia Tabunakawai, added: “Traceability under a catch documentation scheme is a useful tool in identifying legally and sustainably-caught fish from others.”
“No doubt we must treat conservation and management with a sense of urgency and recognise that we are dealing with a finite resource that requires regional and joint actions to ensure its long term security.”
