Southern Bluefin Tuna - Conservation

Conservation

The southern bluefin tuna is now classified as Critically Endangered on the IUCN Red List of Threatened species. In 2010, Greenpeace International has added the SBT to its seafood red list. The Greenpeace International seafood red list is a list of fish that are commonly sold in supermarkets around the world, and which Greenpeace believe have a very high risk of being sourced from unsustainable fisheries.

There was a pressing obligation to alleviate some of the harvesting pressure on SBT populations, and increasing concerns about sustainability in the mid-1980s led the main nations fishing SBT at the time to manage catches. These nations imposed strict quotas to their fishing fleets, although no official quotas were put in place.

In 1994, the then existing voluntary management arrangement between Australia, Japan and New Zealand was formalised when the Convention for the Conservation of Southern Bluefin Tuna came into force. The Convention created the Commission for the Conservation of Southern Bluefin Tuna (CCSBT). Its objective was to ensure, through appropriate management, the conservation and optimum utilisation of the global SBT fishery. South Korea, Taiwan and Indonesia have since joined or are cooperating with the Commission. The CCSBT is headquartered in Canberra, Australia.

Current quota limits reflect the vulnerable nature of wild stocks, with quotas being reduced for the 2010/2011 seasons to 80% of years previous. Thus the global total allowable catch (TAC) has been reduced from 11,810 tonnes from the previously allocated global TAC to 9,449 tonnes. Australia currently has the highest "effective catch limit" with 4,015 tonnes, followed by Japan (2,261), Republic of Korea (859), Fishing Entity of Taiwan (859), New Zealand (709), and Indonesia (651). However, fishing pressure outside the allocated global TAC is still a major concern for instance, the Australian government stated in 2006 that Japan had admitted to taking more than 100,000 tonnes over its quota; the new quotas reflect this, as Japans was cut by half, as supposed punishment for overfishing.

The quota system has actually increased the value of the catch, where fisherman that once earned $600 a ton selling fish to canneries began making more than $1,000 per ton of fish, selling them to buyers for the Japanese market. The quotas are expensive and are bought and sold like stocks within their national allocations.