The growing global market demand for sustainably-certified tuna and increasing interest from the fishing industry will see tuna tonnages from the waters of the Parties to the Nauru Agreement (PNA) double this year, according to its CEO Ludwig Kumoru.
PNA operates a Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) certified free school caught skipjack and yellowfin tuna fishery in the western and central Pacific fishing zones of its member nations.
In 2016, tuna fishing fleets complying with chain of custody rules that met MSC’s certification requirements supplied more than 55,000 metric tons (MT) of sustainably caught free school tuna to market, and based on existing orders, PNA expects that volume to double to around 100,000 MT this year, said Kumoru.
“With strong fishing industry buy-in for PNA’s MSC-certified fishery, we see the market for sustainably caught tuna continuing to grow. This benefits everyone – the fisheries industry, retailers and PNA members. Most importantly, catching tuna without using fish aggregating devices (FADs) means tuna are being fished sustainably.”
Bill Holden of the MSC said PNA had “gone above and beyond what others do” to ensure the tuna caught meets free school catch requirements.
He said a condition of MSC certification for the skipjack tuna fishery was development of “target reference points” for the tuna stock. This was developed by PNA and adopted as policy for this fishery by the Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission (WCPFC) at its 2015 annual meeting.
The next step is a harvest control strategy, which PNA is now engaged in developing for endorsement by the WCPFC, said Holden.
PNA Commercial Manager, Maurice Brownjohn, said MSC-certified skipjack and yellowfin from PNA waters now accounts for over 90 percent of all MSC-certified tuna being traded globally.
Since 2014, the volume of MSC-certified tuna from PNA waters marketed globally has continued to increase exponentially as more industry players see the benefit of participating in the scheme.
PNA said that fishing vessels that deliver free school caught tuna that meets the sustainability guidelines get as much as USD 100 (EUR 96) per MT extra.
The agreement established Pacifical as its marketing co-brand for its MSC-certified tuna, and said that retailers are paying up to a 20 percent premium for the product compared to tuna caught using fish aggregating devices (FADs).
“There has been huge buy-in by private tuna labels and growing interest from brands globally,” Kumoru said. “Today, over 200 purse seiners are participating in the PNA scheme, which is why we anticipate the volume of MSC-certified tuna delivered to market to rise to 100,000 MT in 2017.”
PNA comprises eight members: Federated States of Micronesia, Kiribati, Marshall Islands, Nauru, Palau, Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands and Tuvalu.
