September
06, 2006 - Sydney, Australia — Tuna stocks worldwide
are being critically overfished. More than half
of the world’s tuna comes from the Pacific yet
two species in this region – Pacific bigeye and
yellowfin – will be extinct within three years.
These findings are part of Greenpeace’s
research into the area, which will be highlighted
during the next leg of the Defending our Oceans
ship tour.
The tour takes one of our ships,
the Esperanza, throughout the Pacific to highlight
the problems of tuna overfishing and pirate fishing.
Chief campaigner on board the
Esperanza Lagi Toribau said: “ If we do not want
to see Pacific tuna go the same way as Atlantic
cod, and Pacific livelihoods destroyed; we need
to immediately halve the fishing effort and the
amount of tuna being caught, end pirate fishing,
and create a network of marine reserves – national
parks at sea."
Industrialised nations are moving
into areas like the Pacific because they have
overfished their own seas. These nation’s boats
travel thousands of miles and can take as much
in two days as local fishing fleets take in a
year.
In the Pacific, foreign fishing
fleets from distant countries such as Japan, US,
Taiwan, China, Philippines and the EU take 90
percent of the tuna catch.
Pirate fishing, illegal, unreported
and unregulated fishing is also rife in the region.
Pirates give nothing back and leave a trail of
environmental destruction.
