Taiwan has officially become a full member of the Inter-American Tropical Tuna Commission (IATTC), according to the Council of Agriculture on Friday.

The IATTC is in charge of the management and conservation of tuna in the East Pacific. The waters are a high source of income for Taiwanese who export the raw fish. Taiwan has been an IATTC observer since 1973, but this status has never allowed voting rights for Taiwan within the commission. An official from Taiwan’s Fishery Agency, Tsay Tzu-yaw, explained why Taiwan’s recent entry is significant. Read the rest of this entry »

MANILA, Phillippines — The Philippines will push for the lifting of the tuna fishing ban being implemented by members of the Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission from January this year to December 2011, a ranking fisheries official said on Thursday. Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources Director Malcolm I. Sarmiento, Jr. told reporters that the government is making this move to ease the problem of local tuna fishers, who have run out of stock. Read the rest of this entry »

By Michael Morrah

Conservationists are calling on the Government to support the closure of high sea fisheries in the Pacific to industrial fish netting.

Two areas have already been closed because of concerns about illegal fishing and plummeting tuna stocks. Read the rest of this entry »

The upcoming Indian Ocean Tuna Commission (IOTC) meeting will be held in Sri Lanka, says Dr. Rajitha Senaratne, Minister of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources.

The minister made this statement at a media briefing held at the Government Information Department yesterday.

“Sri Lanka has not submitted any report to the Indian Ocean Tuna Commission about Tuna resources in Sri Lanka after 2007. Therefore they are unaware of our situation. Due to this we are referred to as a country that plunders. Read the rest of this entry »

Private commercial fishing venture planned

By Gif Johnson

MAJURO, Marshall Islands (Marianas Business Journal, July 5, 2010) – A Marshall Islands company has initiated talks with a Taiwan company to build a purse seine fishing vessel and is seeking local investment to fund half of the estimated $15 million cost. Read the rest of this entry »

GENERAL SANTOS CITY — With the three-month fish aggregating device ban now in effect, the government has offered an alternative measure that would allow Filipino fishers to catch tuna in the Philippines’ exclusive economic zone (EEZ), a tuna industry official said yesterday.

Bayani B. Fredeluces, executive director of the Socsargen Federation of Fishing and Allied Industries, Inc., said the Department of Agriculture’s Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources (BFAR) has issued an administrative order allowing tuna catching in the country’s EEZ despite the fish aggregating device ban. Read the rest of this entry »