A GROUP of tuna fishermen from General Santos City on December 18 decried the government’s continued failure to step up efforts to curb illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing which continues to threaten the local tuna fishing, industry.
Raul Gonzales, president of the Alliance of Tuna Handliners, said one year after the issuance of Executive Order (EO) 154, the Department of Agriculture has failed to carry out the order’s key mandate to adopt a national plan of action to prevent, deter and eliminate IUU fishing, and to create a multiagency committee against IUU fishing.
“Executive Order 154 remains to be an order. In terms of its implementation, the only thing that has been done is the mobile registration of vessels with the Marina [Maritime Industry Authority] and BFAR [Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources], which they only started this year. There are many fishermen who remain unlicensed with BFAR and there are no rules and regulations being laid down to address this,” Gonzales said.
Gonzales said that aside from EO 154, other existing regulations are either largely lacking or ineffective against IUU fishing.
In particular, Fisheries Administrative Order (FAO) 226, which disallows trading of juvenile tuna weighing below 500 grams, remains largely ignored due to its poor enforcement at the local level, Gonzales said.
Similarly, the Handline Fishing Law of 2007 remains toothless due to the absence of implementing rules for its implementation, Gonzales said. The group noted that the lack of regulation on IUU fishing has allowed massive juvenile-tuna fishing by big-purse seiners largely unabated. As a result, tuna harvests of handline fishermen in General Santos City are getting smaller and smaller.
“Handline fishermen are having a difficult time catching adult yellow fins and skipjack tuna due to the massive juvenile-tuna fishing in the area done by purse seiners,” Gonzales said. “There are no BFAR officials manning the ports. There are private tuna unloading areas wherein the BFAR has no control over. There is no actual implementation of best fishing practices.”
For his part, Vince Cinches, Oceans campaigner for Greenpeace Philippines, reissued earlier warnings that the country stands to lose billions of pesos in revenues if it fails to improve its scorecard and meet international standards on curbing IUU fishing.
“In GenSan, baby-tuna fishing and trade continues unabated. This is in violation of FAO 246. This kind of unregulated fishing is the primary reason we were issued a yellow card by the European Union [EU]. This is an affirmation of a high level of illegal fishing that has been happening here and that we need reforms,” Cinches said. “We might end up like Sri Lanka, which was blacklisted by the EU and we stand to lose P7.5 billion should this happen.”
The EU issued the Philippines a yellow card in June and required the government to strengthen the “legal framework to combat IUU fishing, improve control and monitoring actions and take a proactive role in complying with international law rules.”
Cinches said Greenpeace is currently in discussions with government agencies on revisions to the Philippine Fisheries Code.
“We are working with the Philippine government to strengthen policies regarding IUU fishing. One of the policies that we are pushing is to increase penalties for illegal fishing, which the big tuna companies are opposing. The EU gave the government until December to work on this,” Cinches said. “We are also pushing the BFAR and other agencies to come up with measures to curb the use of fish aggregating devices, which is a key factor in the declining tuna population.”
Cinches also said Greenpeace is sitting down with major tuna companies to help beef up internal procurement systems to ensure that their tuna supply is in compliance with FAO 226.
He said if efforts to meet EU requirements and improve the sustainability of tuna fishing in General Santos City are to succeed, major players in the tuna industry should adopt international fishing standards and industry best practices.
“Our campaign is not to damage the tuna industry, but to help it sustain itself. We need to achieve the balance between environmental protection and food security, and commercial tuna companies should be part of the solution to this dilemma,” he said.
Based on data coming from the Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources, six out of the seven tuna canneries in the country are operating in General Santos City. These are Alliance Select Foods International Inc., Celebes Canning Corp., General Tuna Corp., Ocean Canning Corp., Philbest Canning Corp., and Seatrade Development Canning Corp.
Permex Producer and Exporter Corp. is the only tuna cannery operating in Zamboanga City.
2 comments
Bfars alibi, more laws and penalties are needed. When in fact Bfar lacks implementation. Illegal gears and illegally caught fish from dynamite to hulbot hulbot abound in all their ports and markets. Bfar exec pride themselves in putting laws yet destruction continues with their in action. More laws and penalties are simply basis for more corruption in the fishing ground.
Destruction of fish habitat and corals caused by dynamite and hulbot hulbot are growing daily yet Bfar does nothing. Why not ban hulbot hulbot gears and vessels. They continue to operate and create havoc to our fish habitat while Bfar simply sit in their air conditioned offices proposing more laws.. Laws to comply with EU and not that will truly address the conditions in our country.
Basta pumasok na greenpeace, walang mangyayaring maganda para sa mahihirap yan. anti-poor mga yan. eco-terrorists. laway puhunan.