Wild Ocean Blue

This week, international negotiations are raging over a group of species that conservationists say are being pushed towards extinction. The cause of the problem: uncontrolled trade.

Votes are already coming in and the first big result is a NO VOTE on a potential ban trade in Bluefin Tuna. The trade will go on. Japan must be thrilled.

Inside a net with a shoal of doomed bluefin tuna. Photo by Marco Carè Marine Photobank

The plan – proposed by Monaco – had been to add the Atlantic Bluefin Tuna to appendix I of CITES – the Convention on Trade in Endangered Species of wild fauna and flora.

Every two years, CITES members meet to decide which species should be added, removed, or upgraded on their lists that offer endangered animals and plants protection from international trade. Appendix I means a global trade ban. Appendix II means global regulation, aimed  to keep the trade well within sustainable limits.

If the tuna vote had been Yes, it would have put a halt – for now – on legal trade in Bluefins from the Atlantic. Who knows what the consequences might have been: the black market might have carried on supplying anyone who wanted sushi. A new breed of sushi tourism might have opened up in Mediterranean countries that catch Bluefins (this was going to be a ban on international trade, not on catching them).

But Japan, Canada and a number of poorer nations voted against the proposal. And so the trade will continue, and we’ve missed a chance to help make sure there will still be Bluefins cruising the Atlantic in years to come.

Bluefin in a cage. Photo by Marco Carè Marine Photobank

And this is all despite overwhelming evidence that there are now few enough of these fish left in the oceans to meet CITES’ stringent rules for a global trade ban.

Many claim that the tuna is being watched over by ICCAT – the International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tunas, so CITES isn’t needed. But perhaps a more appropriate acronym could be the International Conspiracy to Catch All Tunas.

ICCAT set annual catch limits based on scientific data. These are not low enough and are often exceeded.

If you want a balanced and thorough overview of the Bluefin situation, I urge you to have a read of IUCN and TRAFFIC’s review of the CITES proposal to ban the trade. They have crunched a huge volume of data and offer a neat summary of the whole deal.

There’s a small chance the Bluefin No vote will be overturned at the end of the meeting. But it doesn’t seem likely.

We’ll have to wait and see if the Bluefins turn up again in the next round of CITES discussions in 2 years time.

Meanwhile, there are other threatened marine species under the CITES spotlight this week. A group of shark species have been proposed for trade regulation – not ban – under CITES. They include Oceanic Whitetips and Hammerhead sharks, both heavily exploited for their fins.

Oceanic Whitetip Shark. Photo by Michael Aston

I’ll be watching especially closely, since I was involved in writing reviews of the CITES shark trade proposals.

I can only hope these opportunities to help protect ocean biodiversity won’t also be thrown away.