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CP10 tagging cruise collaborates with ISSF and industry to do research on drifting fads
Friday, 10 October 2014 16:25

FishIn last August 2014, SPC fisheries scientist Bruno Leroy was in charge for this 25 day cruise that drove the Tongan FV Pacific Sunrise through the waters of American Samoa, Tokelau, Cook Islands and Kiribati-Phoenix Islands. The Central Pacific (CP) tuna tagging cruises were originally designed to tag tuna in areas where pole and line boats could not really work due to the scarcity of live baits and also to increase the releases of tagged bigeye tuna that are rarely caught in the surface fisheries in the western part of the Pacific.

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Tuna tissue bank for ecosystem management in the Pacific
Friday, 10 October 2014 12:09

FishSince 2001, SPC’s Oceanic Fisheries Programme (OFP) has been coordinating the collection of biological samples of pelagic species from all over the Pacific Islands region on behalf of its member countries.

Initially, this collection was focussed on stomach, muscle and liver samples to understand the trophic structure of the pelagic ecosystem (i.e. who eats who, where, and when); however, this has expanded to include gonads (reproductive organs), otoliths (ear bones), spines and blood, giving the opportunity to study reproduction, age, growth and contaminant concentrations.

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The best way to protect heavily depleted shark populations? Stop trying to catch them!
Friday, 12 September 2014 15:01

sheltonh2014_09_12-silky_shark_thumbFriday 12 September 2014, Secretariat of the Pacific Community (SPC), Noumea, New Caledonia

It was previously thought that the two heavily depleted pelagic sharks in the Western and Central Pacific, the silky and the oceanic whitetip, were victims of unintended bycatch, but a startling new study from the Secretariat of the Pacific Community (SPC) shows that sharks are actually being specifically targeted by some tuna longline boats operating in the equatorial Pacific Ocean.

 

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Lack of Access to Data Frustates Scientists
Wednesday, 16 April 2014 14:39

Honiara fishing port in Solomon Islands (Credit: Malo Hosken, Copyright: Secretariat of the Pacific Community)A meeting of over 20 stock assessment scientists from the Asia–Pacific region last week heard that the scientific assessment of tunas in the western and central Pacific Ocean (WCPO) continues to be hampered by some fishing states not making data available to scientists. Dr Shelton Harley, head of the Stock Assessment and Modelling team within the Secretariat of the Pacific Community (SPC) Oceanic Fisheries Programme noted that ‘the most frustrating aspect is that the data have been collected and are just sitting on computers in countries and not contributing to the efforts to determine the health and safe harvest levels for the largest tuna resource in the world.

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SPC scientists tackle stock assessment for blue sharks in the North Pacific Ocean
Friday, 14 February 2014 09:14

sheltonH2014_02_14_thumbSPC stock assessment scientists Shelton Harley and Joel Rice have just returned from a one week blue shark stock assessment workshop in San Diego, California. Here Shelton reports on what makes this assessment a little different to others typically undertaken by SPC.

The assessment for blue sharks in the North Pacific is the third shark stock assessment undertaken by SPC as part of our service agreement to the Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission (WCPFC). Two unique features of this assessment are: 1) that it covers an area outside of the mandate of the WCPFC and therefore requires close collaboration with the Inter-American Tropical Tuna Commission (IATTC) and the International Scientific Committee for tuna and tuna-like species (ISC); and 2) the SPC stock assessment is one of two that are to be undertaken for the stock.

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A scientific perspective on current challenges for PICT domestic tuna longline fleets that are dependent on south Pacific albacore
Wednesday, 12 February 2014 10:59

grahamP2014_02_12_thumbIn recent years domestic fishing fleets targeting primarily albacore in Pacific Island Countries and Territories (PICTs) have reported difficulties in maintaining profitability, and as noted in a PITIA press article, in the last few months many vessels based in Fiji have stopped fishing altogether and are tied up at wharves. The PITIA article notes that despite their experiences on the water, scientific stock assessments “continue to produce relatively healthy results”.

The purpose of this article is to summarise some of the recent scientific analyses of south Pacific albacore. It won’t discuss issues such as the prices of fish or fuel, or the mobility of fleets that enhances or constrains their ability to follow or find fish; clearly these issues would be expected to play a large role in the profitability of individual fleets.

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New fish species discovered in the waters of New Caledonia
Wednesday, 08 October 2014 14:51

Tuesday, 2 September 2014

FishWhile on a boat not far from Toombo Reef near Boulari Pass on 11 August 2014, Pierre and William Larue found a small silvery fish floating on the water.

The fish was first given to the IRD (French Institute of Research for Development) and then SPC took over the task of identifying this small hatchetfish from the Sternoptychidae family.

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Condition of bigeye tuna in the western and central Pacific worsening, skipjack and yellowfin healthy – new SPC assessments released
Friday, 25 July 2014 15:48

johnh2014_07_25_thumbFriday 25 July 2014, Secretariat of the Pacific Community (SPC) headquarters, Noumea, New Caledonia

The Secretariat of the Pacific Community (SPC) this week released new assessments on the status of key regional tuna stocks – skipjack, yellowfin and bigeye tuna – which show that skipjack and yellowfin remain in a reasonably healthy state, but bigeye, the mainstay of the tropical longline fishery, has now been reduced to less than 20% of its unfished stock size. The assessments, along with over 40 scientific papers produced by SPC, are due to be presented at the 10th meeting of the Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission (WCPFC) Scientific Committee, being held in Majuro, Marshall Islands, in early August.

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SPC Fisheries Newsletter #143
Tuesday, 16 October 2012 15:07

The number of active tuna fisheries observers in the Pacific islands region has been well over 400 per year since 2010, and keeps increasing. This is a direct consequence of the Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission’s Conservation and Management Measure 2008–01, which prescribes 100% observer coverage of purse-seine vessels operating in the region. For an outside viewer it seems that all that needs to be done to achieve this goal is to hire people with a basic knowledge of what a fish looks like and send them on fishing cruises to record what they see. Piece of cake, right?

Not surprisingly, reality is quite different.

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Three new staff members to join the stock assessment and modelling (OFP SAM) team in 2014
Wednesday, 12 February 2014 15:12

samLate 2013 saw the departures of Dr Tim Adams to warmer and more humid climes, Dr Simon Hoyle to cooler and less humid climes, and Dr Aaron Berger downstairs to a new post within the OFP analysing tagging data. It also saw approval of the New Zealand Scientific Support project, which provided the team a second national scientist position. So over the past couple of months we have been searching far and wide for people to join the team and we are pleased to announce three new additions to the Stock Assessment and Modelling team.

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SPC secures a unique world record – 100,000 tuna tagged by one individual
Friday, 20 December 2013 11:15

The tuna tagging experiments conducted by SPC’s Oceanic Fisheries Programme (OFP) are acknowledged to be among the most comprehensive in the world and have recently achieved yet another milestone.

After four decades of involvement in Pacific Island tuna fisheries, Dr Antony Lewis recently achieved the mark of 100,000 tuna tagged by an individual, which is a world record unlikely ever to be surpassed.

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