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International Journal of Marine Science 2013, Vol.3, No.24, 187-192
http://ijms.sophiapublisher.com
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the management of tunas is complicated by their
trans-oceanic migratory nature, and calls for special
cooperation among tuna fishing nations, since no one
nation alone can manage tuna resources effectively.
There are several international fisheries management
organizations such as the International Commission
for the Conservation of the Atlantic Tuna and
Tuna-like species (ICCAT), the Inter-American
Tropical Tuna Commission (IATTC), and the Convention
for the Conservation of Southern Bluefin Tuna
(CCSBT) etc., which are now responsible for
management of the tuna fisheries in each Ocean. The
Indian Ocean Tuna Commission (IOTC) is an
intergovernmental organization mandated to manage
tuna and tuna-like species in the Indian Ocean and
adjacent seas. Tuna fisheries management to date has
often been ineffective, focusing on maximizing the
catch of a single target species and often ignoring
habitat, predators and prey of the target species and
other ecosystem components and interactions. To
address the critical need for more effective and
holistic management approach a variety of advisory
panels (Botsford et al., 1997; Pikitch et al., 2004;
Worm et al., 2005) have recommended ecosystem
considerations to be regarded broadly and consistently
in managing sustainable fisheries. There have been
numerous prescriptions and admonitions to implement
ecosystem-based fisheries management. The overall
objective of conservation and management approach
is to sustain healthy marine ecosystem and the
fisheries. In particular Tuna Conservation and Fishery
Management (TCFM) should give (a)
early warning
signs of pressure on the stock of major species -albacore,
bigeye and yellowfin catches should not exceed the
MSY level, (b) high seas drift gillnetting should be
banned and FAD associated –fishing should be
regulated, (c) annual species – wise stock assessment
to be made, (d) the number of hooks and length of line
to be regulated in longline fishing, (e) Introduction of
large meshed purse seine for high sea tuna fishing, (f)
capture based culture of tuna should be regulated/banned,
(g) countries operating their vessels under Letter of
Permission (LOP) agreement for tuna fishing should
report their catches to the native country, (h) IUU
fishing in Indian waters by other countries should be
banned, (i) tagging experiments for skipjack and
yellowfin in the Indian EEZ should be undertaken, (j)
discourage rampant poaching which will be to the
benefit of the Indian fishing industry, (k) ensure
constant supply of high quality raw material and
enable optimum utilization of the capacity of Indian
processing plants, (l) provide essential support for
training and research, (m) introduction of modified
pole and line/longlines/hand lines/troll line for
catching yellowfin tuna around Andaman Nicobar,
Lakshadweep islands, (n) monitoring and data
collection be further strengthened over the coming
years, (o) As Indian tuna fisherman has capable of
catching oceanic tunas, permitting foreign fishing
vessels to operate in the Indian waters under LOP
system have to be abolished, (p) With the
collaboration of the tuna fishery bodies and
International and National organization involved in
tuna fishing, fisheries research and management can
provide necessary technical information and modern
post-harvest handling procedures for high priced
sashimi
grade tuna to fishermen community, (q)
identify and resolve the technical problems associated
with the sustainable management of tuna fishing on
the Indian Ocean scale, taking into account conservation
and socio-economic issues, (r) substantial lowering of
the cost of production could be achieved, mainly
through small scale fisheries, improved efficiency of
fishing methods, reduced import of fishing fleet from
developed countries, increased utilization of bycatch
and discards, by creating value added products from
them and by introducing a wide range of management
measures. (s) Govt. of India should review the current
situation of deep sea/oceanic fishing in the Indian EEZ
and contiguous waters, and develop a sound and
effective Deep Sea fishing Policy, (t)Tuna fishery
sector has facing an insufficient financial support for
the introduction of well devised deep sea fishing
vessels in the EEZ of India. In countries such as
Norway and Denmark, separate fisheries bank have
been set up, obviously because of the distinctive
characteristics of the fishery sector and the need to
have separate banking set-up for the purpose. The
developing countries like India, the system for fishery
sector has been to set up the National Marine Fisheries
bank which provides a guarantee to the financing
of introducing deep sea fishing vessels and for
securing other needed infrastructure facilities.
Another goal of TCFM is to reduce excessive level of
bycatch (i.e.) (killing of non target undersized
individuals of other related species) because juveniles