Jack mackerel catches wrap up well within TAC once more; Damanzaihao now listed as authorized
Eva Tallaksen
Jack mackerel catches in the South Pacific are up from last year, confirming talk of improved fishing in Chile and the high seas.
However, volumes still look set to fall below the 2014 total allowable catch (TAC) of 440,000 metric tons agreed by the South Pacific Regional Fisheries Management Organization (SPRFMO) at its annual meeting in Manta, Ecuador last January.
According to SPRFMO data seen by Undercurrent News, some 366,000t of jack mackerel were reported as caught by members of the organization, and by Peru and Ecuador, by the end of October this year.
That’s a significant increase from the 290,868t reported — by the end of November last year, when catches also failed to reach the annual TAC of 440,000t.
Fishing has pretty much wrapped up, with the Chinese vessels among the last to still be active, said one fishing industry source.
Up in Chile, small increase in high seas
Of the catch volumes reported, approximately 316,000t were caught by in the international high seas managed by the organization and in Chilean waters (see table below).
This is once again short of the TAC of 390,000t set for those areas, but up from the 261,391t caught by the end of November last year.
Catches were up both in the high seas, from less than 50,000t to some 61,000t, but mainly in Chile, which had caught 255,540t by the end of October, up from 214,612t by end November last year. Chile had set a TAC of 290,000t for this year.
Jack mackerel catches reported to the SPRFMO within the convention’s waters by end of October 2014
Table 1: Jack mackerel catches reported to the SPRFMO within the convention’s waters by end of October 2014
Both the Faroe Islands and Russia caught none of their allowance, set at 5.062t and 13,445t respectively. According to one fishing source, Russia has been trying to sell its share of the jack mackerel quota. The country has no vessel authorized to the fishery any more, with Pacific Andes’ mothership Lafayette, now renamed Damanzaihao, having changed flag to Peru after failing to get Russian approval to operate in the fishery.
The Faroes did not send any vessel to the fishery, which one source said was due to lack of suitable vessels.
TACs agreed on for catches in Chile’s EEZ and the high seas for 2014. Source: SPRFMO/ Undercurrent News
TACs agreed on for catches in Chile’s EEZ and the high seas for 2014. Source: SPRFMO/ Undercurrent News
Peru’s catches in international waters have also been minimal – the country reported just 395t, out of its 4,238t allowance.
South Korea and the European Union have come the closest to meeting their TAC, catching 4,078t out of 4,080t and 19,565t out of 21,652t, respectively.
China had caught 21,135t out of its allowance of 27,655t by end of October, and Vanuatu 15,364t out of 19,466t.
Up in Peru
Jack mackerel catches reported to the SPRFMO within Peruvian and Ecuadorian waters by end of October 2014
Table 2: Jack mackerel catches reported to the SPRFMO within Peruvian and Ecuadorian waters by end of October 2014
The remaining 50,000t were reported as caught by Peru in its own exclusive economic zone, while Ecuador has reported nil catches (table 2). The two countries have not ratified the SPRFMO convention but take part as a cooperating non-members.
Peru’s decision shortly after the SPRFMO meeting in January to set its own jack mackerel TAC to 130,000t — of which 104,000t for the industrial fleet — had raised fears that the total catch would exceed the 440,000t limit set by the SPRFMO.
In the event, it appears slow catches in Peru mean these concerns have not materialized. Undercurrent News was unable to ascertain, however, if the catches reported include volumes from the country’s artisanal fleet.
Pacific Andes’ Damanzaihao gets approval
Meanwhile, SPRFMO’s website has been updated to show that Damanzaihao is now authorized to take part in the fishery.
The SPRFMO’s executive secretary Johanne Fischer did not return a request for comment by the time of publication, and the website does not indicate when the vessel was added to the list.
As reported by Undercurrent, the vessel was transshipping in the SPRFMO zone despite the organization saying the vessel had been given no authorization from its flag-state Peru.
The SPRFMO then received a request for approval from Peru, but responded that the request put it in a difficult position as the vessel had been added on its draft list of suspected IUU (illegal, unreported and unregulated) fishing vessels.
However, the SPRFMO secretariat stressed that the list is preliminary and still under scrutiny and said the vessel is considered innocent while the investigation goes on — Pacific Andes itself has alluded to a misunderstanding, saying it was confident it had been given authorization by Peru.
“Our understanding is that the vessel is authorized as we were copied on a
letter from the Peruvian government on 15 August, 2014, providing the
vessel details to the SPRFMO,” Geoffrey Walsh, spokesperson for the company and its Hong Kong-based fishing subsidiary China Fishery Group, had told Undercurrent on Sept. 15.
