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	<channel>
		<title>Conservation news</title>
		<atom:link href="https://news.mongabay.com/feed/?s=&#038;type=post&#038;topic=tuna" rel="self" type="application/rss+xml" />
		<link>https://news.mongabay.com/list/tuna/</link>
		<description>Environmental science and conservation news</description>
		<lastBuildDate>Thu, 15 Oct 2026 10:17:25 +0000</lastBuildDate>
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	<url>https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2020/05/16160320/cropped-mongabay_icon-32x32.png</url>
	<title>News on Tuna</title>
	<link>https://news.mongabay.com/list/tuna/</link>
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				<item>
					<title>Nations at southern bluefin tuna meeting stop short of adopting new seabird protections</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/10/nations-at-southern-bluefin-tuna-meeting-stop-short-of-adopting-new-seabird-protections/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/10/nations-at-southern-bluefin-tuna-meeting-stop-short-of-adopting-new-seabird-protections/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>15 Oct 2026 10:17:25 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Edward Carver]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Autumn Spanne]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/10/15063719/6_B_Wandering_albatrosses_South_Georgia_Jamie_Latimer-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=332681</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Arctic Ocean, Asia, Atlantic Ocean, Australia, Belgium, East Asia, Europe, Global, Indian Ocean, Japan, New Zealand, Oceania, Pacific Islands, Pacific Ocean, Polynesia, Southern Ocean, and Taiwan]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Biodiversity, Birds, Bycatch, Conservation, Ecosystems, Environment, Fish, Fisheries, Fishing, Governance, Marine, Marine Animals, Marine Conservation, Oceans, Saltwater Fish, Seabirds, Tuna, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Seabird protections drew debate at the annual meeting of the Commission for the Conservation of Southern Bluefin Tuna (CCSBT), held Oct. 5-8 in Brussels. The eight-member multilateral body that manages the stock has long struggled to curb seabird deaths caused by longline fishing targeting southern bluefin tuna (Thunnus maccoyii) across several oceans. This year’s meeting [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Seabird protections drew debate at the annual meeting of the Commission for the Conservation of Southern Bluefin Tuna (CCSBT), held Oct. 5-8 in Brussels. The eight-member multilateral body that manages the stock has long struggled to curb seabird deaths caused by longline fishing targeting southern bluefin tuna (Thunnus maccoyii) across several oceans. This year’s meeting saw a modicum of progress on the issue. Based on recent modeling, the parties agreed on 13 priority seabird species for conservation efforts and designated high-risk areas for them. However, the designations don’t carry any new mandatory protections: Due to the reluctance of some members, the commission stopped short of adopting proposed conservation measures for the high-risk areas, most notably tighter seabird bycatch mitigation requirements. Oliver Yates, head of the marine program at BirdLife International, a U.K.-based NGO, told Mongabay that the identification of high-risk areas was “a good step forward” but said it was a problem that “they&#8217;ve not then adopted any management action to accompany the fishing activity in those spatial areas.” “[T]hey recognise bycatch of seabirds is a very serious issue but again agreed to do nothing about it,” Yates, who attended the Brussels meeting, added in a text message. There are more than a dozen RFMOs in the world, with some overlapping geographically but managing different fish stocks. The map shows the five best-known and most commercially important RFMOs, which focus on tuna and tuna-like species. Image courtesy of Pew Charitable Trusts. Sources: U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization, FAO Map Catalog.&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/10/nations-at-southern-bluefin-tuna-meeting-stop-short-of-adopting-new-seabird-protections/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/10/nations-at-southern-bluefin-tuna-meeting-stop-short-of-adopting-new-seabird-protections/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-332681</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Pacific bluefin tuna will get some help as countries agree to new harvest strategy</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/09/pacific-bluefin-tuna-will-get-some-help-as-countries-agree-to-new-harvest-strategy/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/09/pacific-bluefin-tuna-will-get-some-help-as-countries-agree-to-new-harvest-strategy/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>14 Sep 2026 08:59:07 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Francesco De Augustinis]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Autumn Spanne]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/09/13160625/b.-BANNER-GP01Y3H-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=329570</guid>

					
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Fish, Fisheries, Fishing, Marine Animals, Oceans, Overfishing, Saltwater Fish, and Tuna]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[The annual meeting of the Inter-American Tropical Tuna Commission (IATTC) concluded on Sept. 4 with an agreement to adopt a long-term harvest strategy for Pacific bluefin tuna. The agreement aims to ensure sustainable management of this species, which has only recently recovered after decades of overfishing. But the commission fell short of establishing a harvest [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[The annual meeting of the Inter-American Tropical Tuna Commission (IATTC) concluded on Sept. 4 with an agreement to adopt a long-term harvest strategy for Pacific bluefin tuna. The agreement aims to ensure sustainable management of this species, which has only recently recovered after decades of overfishing. But the commission fell short of establishing a harvest strategy for other tuna species — bigeye, skipjack and yellowfin — managed under the convention. “A proposal was adopted … and that’s really great progress,” Dave Gershman, a senior officer for international fisheries at the U.S.-based think tank The Pew Charitable Trusts, who took part in the meeting as an observer, told Mongabay. The commission approved the plan for Pacific bluefin tuna (Thunnus orientalis) after 10 years of research and mediation. The plan establishes science-based rules to support the stock&#8217;s complete recovery and long-term protection while taking into account impacts on the broader ecosystem. “You want to have these things in place when times are good so it’s there when you need it,” Gershman said. The 104th meeting of the IATTC took place in Lisbon from Aug. 31 to Sept. 4. One of five main regional fishery management organizations (RFMOs) responsible for tuna and tuna-like species, the commission is tasked with managing six tuna stocks, associated species and their ecosystems throughout the Eastern Pacific Ocean, from Canada south to Chile. There are more than a dozen RFMOs in the world, with some overlapping geographically but managing different fish stocks. The map shows the five best-known&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/09/pacific-bluefin-tuna-will-get-some-help-as-countries-agree-to-new-harvest-strategy/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-329570</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Drifting tuna fishing gear enter half of marine protected areas: study</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/07/drifting-tuna-fishing-gear-enter-half-of-marine-protected-areas-study-finds/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/07/drifting-tuna-fishing-gear-enter-half-of-marine-protected-areas-study-finds/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>31 Jul 2026 17:21:21 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Keith Anthony Fabro]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Autumn Spanne]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/07/31162145/f-Juvenile-yellowfin-tuna-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=325073</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Global]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Conservation, Environment, Fish, Marine, Marine Animals, Marine Conservation, Marine Protected Areas, Protected Areas, Research, Saltwater Fish, Tuna, and Waste]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Marine protected areas (MPAs) may prohibit industrial fishing within their boundaries, but they cannot stop fishing gear released elsewhere from drifting inside. A new global study estimates that drifting fish aggregating devices (dFADs) used by industrial tuna fleets affect more than half of the world’s protected marine areas. Some travel thousands of kilometers before sinking [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Marine protected areas (MPAs) may prohibit industrial fishing within their boundaries, but they cannot stop fishing gear released elsewhere from drifting inside. A new global study estimates that drifting fish aggregating devices (dFADs) used by industrial tuna fleets affect more than half of the world’s protected marine areas. Some travel thousands of kilometers before sinking or washing ashore, where they can damage coral reefs, entangle wildlife and leave coastal communities with the burden of removing the debris. Published in Science Advances in June 2026, the study combined fishing records, published research, an online survey of MPA staff and experts, and follow-up interviews to assess the global distribution, strandings and impacts of drifting FADs in MPAs. “We were surprised to find that FADs appear to affect more than half of the world’s protected marine area, and that impacts often occurred thousands of kilometers from the original fishing grounds,” study co-author Boris Worm, a marine ecologist at Dalhousie University in Canada, told Mongabay by email. A purse seiner attached to a FAD catches a school of tuna in the Western Central Pacific. Image © Paul Hilton / Greenpeace. Fishing gear does not respect boundaries dFADs are floating rafts deployed by purse-seine fishing vessels — industrial boats that encircle schools of tuna with large nets — to attract skipjack (Katsuwonus pelamis), yellowfin (Thunnus albacares) and bigeye tuna (Thunnus obesus). The devices carry satellite-linked buoys and echo sounders that allow companies to track them and estimate the fish below. But many are later deactivated,&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/07/drifting-tuna-fishing-gear-enter-half-of-marine-protected-areas-study-finds/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/07/drifting-tuna-fishing-gear-enter-half-of-marine-protected-areas-study-finds/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-325073</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title> Seeking swordfish, catching dolphins and whales: EU pushes to rein in driftnets</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/07/seeking-swordfish-catching-dolphins-and-whales-eu-pushes-to-rein-in-driftnets/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/07/seeking-swordfish-catching-dolphins-and-whales-eu-pushes-to-rein-in-driftnets/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>08 Jul 2026 20:24:33 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Victoria Schneider]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Autumn Spanne]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/07/08160916/a.-BANNER-GP0156K-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=322913</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Africa, European Union, Mediterranean Sea, Morocco, and Spain]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Biodiversity, Bycatch, Cetaceans, Dolphins, Elasmobranchs, Fisheries, Fishing, Food, Illegal Fishing, Marine Animals, Marine Conservation, Marine Mammals, Oceans, Sharks, Tuna, and Whales]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Driftnets, vertically hanging nets that drift with ocean currents and can stretch for kilometers, are used to catch large pelagic species such as swordfish and tuna. However, they have long drawn criticism from conservationists as they also capture and kill sharks, turtles, dolphins and other marine wildlife. For decades, debate has raged about use of [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Driftnets, vertically hanging nets that drift with ocean currents and can stretch for kilometers, are used to catch large pelagic species such as swordfish and tuna. However, they have long drawn criticism from conservationists as they also capture and kill sharks, turtles, dolphins and other marine wildlife. For decades, debate has raged about use of the large nets. It’s a particularly contentious issue in the Mediterranean Sea, an important migration corridor that faces considerable pressure from overfishing, pollution and climate change. Now, international efforts to tighten legislation on driftnets in the Mediterranean have gained new momentum as member states of the International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tunas (ICCAT) consider a proposal aimed at closing loopholes in existing rules. ICCAT is the world’s largest regional fisheries management organization, managing the stocks of highly migratory species, including tuna, swordfish (Xiphias gladius) and some shark species across the Atlantic Ocean and adjacent seas. At ICCAT’s technical meetings held in Brussels in June, the European Union presented a proposal (see IMM_09_ENG.docx in link) that seeks to strengthen current driftnet rules. Fishers haul an illegal driftnet in international waters west of Marettimo Island, near Sicily. Image © Gavin Parsons/Greenpeace. The EU proposal would establish clearer definitions for driftnets, prohibit their possession on vessels that target certain species, and extend restrictions beyond the Mediterranean to parts of the Atlantic Ocean. “The EU has the clear ambition to push for the adoption of this measure at this year’s annual meeting of ICCAT (in November),” an&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/07/seeking-swordfish-catching-dolphins-and-whales-eu-pushes-to-rein-in-driftnets/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/07/seeking-swordfish-catching-dolphins-and-whales-eu-pushes-to-rein-in-driftnets/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-322913</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Indian Ocean tuna regulator eases yellowfin fishing curbs amid sustainability concerns</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/05/indian-ocean-tuna-regulator-eases-yellowfin-fishing-curbs-amid-sustainability-concerns/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/05/indian-ocean-tuna-regulator-eases-yellowfin-fishing-curbs-amid-sustainability-concerns/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>22 May 2026 14:12:11 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Malavika Vyawahare]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Autumn Spanne]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/05/22134904/Capture_dun_thon_albacore_pour_marquage_electronique_Ifremer_00699-81068_-_33228-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=319993</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Indian Ocean and Maldives]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Biodiversity, Conservation, Environment, Fish, Fishing, Governance, Oceans, Overfishing, and Tuna]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[An annual meeting of the regulatory body overseeing the tuna fishery across the Indian Ocean has agreed to update the rules governing one of the region’s most iconic species: yellowfin tuna. The easing of fishing curbs can be traced to the Indian Ocean Tuna Commission’s (IOTC) scientific body finding that Thunnus albacares stocks aren’t overfished, [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[An annual meeting of the regulatory body overseeing the tuna fishery across the Indian Ocean has agreed to update the rules governing one of the region’s most iconic species: yellowfin tuna. The easing of fishing curbs can be traced to the Indian Ocean Tuna Commission’s (IOTC) scientific body finding that Thunnus albacares stocks aren’t overfished, nor are they currently experiencing overfishing in the Indian Ocean. The body first made the determination in 2024, but the finding underwent an internal review process before being accepted by the commission at its recent meeting in the Maldives. The meeting held in May was attended by delegates from coastal nations in Asia, Africa and Oceania, as well as distant-water fishing powers like Japan and the European Union. Now, that scientific advice has translated into a reframing of the management rules, provoking sharply divided reactions. Conservationists are urging caution, citing the long history of yellowfin overfishing and the difficulties in monitoring and curbing overexploitation. Industry representatives, meanwhile, hailed the decision, saying it secures access to one of the region’s most lucrative tuna fisheries. At the meeting in the Maldives, parties agreed on a total allowable catch (TAC) and quotas for contracting members for the period from 2027-2028. In doing so, the IOTC became the first tuna regional fisheries management organization (RFMO) to implement catch allocation systems for all three tropical tuna species under its management: yellowfin, skipjack and bigeye. The IOTC adopted its first yellowfin rebuilding plan in 2016, on the back of scientific evidence&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/05/indian-ocean-tuna-regulator-eases-yellowfin-fishing-curbs-amid-sustainability-concerns/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-319993</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Azores dodges proposal to overturn no-fishing zones in its giant new MPA network</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/02/azores-dodges-proposal-to-overturn-no-fishing-zones-in-its-giant-new-mpa-network/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/02/azores-dodges-proposal-to-overturn-no-fishing-zones-in-its-giant-new-mpa-network/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>23 Feb 2026 19:29:18 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Maria José Mendes]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Rebecca Kessler]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/02/23192451/b.-OceanImageBank_EllenCuylaerts_01-1-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=314634</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Atlantic Ocean, Europe, and Portugal]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Cetaceans, Conservation, Dolphins, Ecosystems, Environment, Fish, Fishing, Islands, Marine, Marine Animals, Marine Protected Areas, Oceans, Regulations, Sea Turtles, Seabirds, and Tuna]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[SÃO MATEUS, Portugal — Winter forced Emanuel Alves to remove his boat from the water at the port of São Mateus in the Azores, the Portuguese archipelago in the North Atlantic Ocean. The 64-year-old fisher expressed concern about the giant network of marine protected areas that permeates the archipelago. &#8220;Where are we going to fish [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[SÃO MATEUS, Portugal — Winter forced Emanuel Alves to remove his boat from the water at the port of São Mateus in the Azores, the Portuguese archipelago in the North Atlantic Ocean. The 64-year-old fisher expressed concern about the giant network of marine protected areas that permeates the archipelago. &#8220;Where are we going to fish now?” he asked. The law establishing the Azores Marine Protected Areas Network was approved in October 2024 and took effect just recently, on Jan. 1 this year. The network now safeguards 30% of Azorean waters, 287,000 square kilometers (110,800 square miles) of seascape sheltering a rich array of marine life. Not two weeks later, on Jan. 15, the Azores Parliament voted to uphold a core provision of the MPA network, after it came under fire in recent months: No fishing inside the fully protected areas, which constitute half the vast network. Pico Mountain on Pico Island in the Azores, the tallest mountain in Portugal at 2,351 meters (7,713 feet). Image by Maria José Mendes for Mongabay. The vote effectively killed an earlier move to open these areas to pole-and-line tuna fishing that would have been “catastrophic and damaging to the region,” according to Luís Bernardo Brito e Abreu, coordinator of Blue Azores, a Portugal-based partnership between the Azores regional government, the U.S.-based nonprofit Waitt Institute and the Portugal-based Oceano Azul Foundation that began advocating for the establishment of the MPA network in 2019. “[The] criterion for a total protection area is indeed total protection; there&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/02/azores-dodges-proposal-to-overturn-no-fishing-zones-in-its-giant-new-mpa-network/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-314634</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Abandoned tuna-fishing devices pollute the Galápagos Marine Reserve</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/02/abandoned-tuna-fishing-devices-pollute-the-galapagos-marine-reserve/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/02/abandoned-tuna-fishing-devices-pollute-the-galapagos-marine-reserve/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>09 Feb 2026 17:35:37 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Marlowe Starling]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Rebecca Kessler]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/02/05155327/a.-BANNER-GP01Y49-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=313784</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Ecuador, Galapagos, Latin America, and South America]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Biodiversity, Conservation, Coral Reefs, Ecosystems, Environment, Environmental Law, Fish, Fisheries, Fishing, Marine, Marine Animals, Marine Conservation, Marine Protected Areas, Oceans, Pollution, Saltwater Fish, Tuna, Water Pollution, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[SANTA CRUZ, GALÁPAGOS ISLANDS, Ecuador — “Good morning,” Walter Borbor, a social media-famous fisher, says to his followers in a 2022 Instagram video. “What we have here is a plantado.” He points to a large black floating device with a trailing rope that’s wrapped around the tail of a decomposing whale — right in the [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[SANTA CRUZ, GALÁPAGOS ISLANDS, Ecuador — “Good morning,” Walter Borbor, a social media-famous fisher, says to his followers in a 2022 Instagram video. “What we have here is a plantado.” He points to a large black floating device with a trailing rope that’s wrapped around the tail of a decomposing whale — right in the middle of the Galápagos Marine Reserve. Plantado is the local name for a fish aggregating device (FAD), a tool industrial tuna fleets commonly deploy to attract numerous tuna they can scoop up all at once. Modern drifting FADs have been used since the 1980s to improve fishing efficiency. Over the past 25 years, they’ve become the primary tuna fishing method, according to a May study in the journal Science. Meanwhile, Ecuador’s tuna fleet grew by roughly half over the same period. Both factors have contributed to more and more abandoned FADs drifting into the Galapagos Marine Reserve from international fleets, sources told Mongabay. Abandoned FADs pose numerous problems. They shed plastic as they break down, damage coral reefs and collide with artisanal fishing boats. Inti Keith, a researcher with the Charles Darwin Foundation, a Galápagos-based science and conservation group, said scientists routinely find sharks, turtles, sea lions, seabirds and other wildlife entangled in the netting — or worse, dead. Now, Galápagos agencies and organizations are banding together to better track and collect these devices. But the root of the issue — their deployment outside the marine reserve — remains a challenge. Yellowtail surgeonfish (Prionurus punctatus)&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/02/abandoned-tuna-fishing-devices-pollute-the-galapagos-marine-reserve/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/02/abandoned-tuna-fishing-devices-pollute-the-galapagos-marine-reserve/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-313784</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Azores must respect its exceptional network of marine protected areas (commentary)</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/01/azores-must-respect-its-exceptional-network-of-marine-protected-areas-commentary/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/01/azores-must-respect-its-exceptional-network-of-marine-protected-areas-commentary/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>05 Jan 2026 17:01:19 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Enric Sala]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Erik Hoffner]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2024/10/29054839/Azores-MPA-Network_Andy-Mann-3-768x512-1.jpeg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=312627</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Atlantic Ocean, Europe, European Union, and Portugal]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[30x30 conservation target, Biodiversity, Commentary, Conservation, Ecosystems, Environment, Fish, Fisheries, Fishing, Governance, Marine, Marine Conservation, Marine Protected Areas, Oceans, and Tuna]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[At the end of 2024, the Azores stood as a beacon of hope and a global leader in ocean conservation, having created the largest network of marine protected areas (MPAs) in the North Atlantic. The Azores safeguarded 30% of its waters — an expanse more than three times larger than Portugal’s landmass — years ahead [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[At the end of 2024, the Azores stood as a beacon of hope and a global leader in ocean conservation, having created the largest network of marine protected areas (MPAs) in the North Atlantic. The Azores safeguarded 30% of its waters — an expanse more than three times larger than Portugal’s landmass — years ahead of the global commitment to protect at least 30% of the global ocean by 2030 (30&#215;30). This decisive action was praised both at home and internationally, with other countries and regions seeking advice from the Azores on how to follow suit. But in a world where major powers are retreating from crucial environmental commitments, the Azores now faces a pivotal test of its own. Early in 2025, a proposal to allow pole-and-line tuna fishing within areas designated as no-take was submitted to the Regional Assembly and is currently under discussion. This maneuver, if successful, risks undoing a monumental achievement. Crucially, half of this network is fully protected, banning all extractive and damaging activities, meaning it far exceeds the European Union’s mandate to fully protect at least 10% of its waters. Allowing industrial tuna fishing within the Azores’ fully protected areas would turn these areas into “paper parks” and defy their very purpose. Rays in the Azores. Image courtesy of Emanuel Goncalves / Oceano Azul Foundation. In other words, these areas would fail to meet the definition of “fully protected” set out in the strict standards established by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN)&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/01/azores-must-respect-its-exceptional-network-of-marine-protected-areas-commentary/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/01/azores-must-respect-its-exceptional-network-of-marine-protected-areas-commentary/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-312627</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Indonesia falls short in bid to increase its share of southern bluefin tuna catch</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/10/indonesia-falls-short-in-bid-to-increase-its-share-of-southern-bluefin-tuna-catch/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/10/indonesia-falls-short-in-bid-to-increase-its-share-of-southern-bluefin-tuna-catch/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>16 Oct 2025 16:13:58 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Edward Carver]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Morgan Erickson-Davis]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Food systems]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/10/16080810/bluefin-tune-australia-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=307759</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Indian Ocean, Indonesia, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Biodiversity, Birds, Bycatch, Conservation, Endangered Species, Environment, Environmental Policy, Fisheries, Fishing, Food, Food Industry, Marine, Marine Animals, Marine Conservation, Oceans, Overconsumption, Overfishing, Regulations, Seabirds, Tuna, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Australia and Japan dominate fishing of southern bluefin tuna, but Indonesia is pushing for a larger share of the global catch. However, its request was not officially acted on at a meeting of the Commission for the Conservation of Southern Bluefin Tuna (CCSBT), the multilateral body that manages the stock, which Indonesia hosted from Oct. [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Australia and Japan dominate fishing of southern bluefin tuna, but Indonesia is pushing for a larger share of the global catch. However, its request was not officially acted on at a meeting of the Commission for the Conservation of Southern Bluefin Tuna (CCSBT), the multilateral body that manages the stock, which Indonesia hosted from Oct. 6-9 on the island of Bali. CCSBT members instead kept each nation’s share unchanged. Indonesia expressed disappointment in the result, having argued that the allotment system is inequitable and unfair to developing countries. “Indonesia views that the current allocation system has not paid due regard to the principles of equity and fairness in international law, which the preamble of the CCSBT Convention emphasizes,” Sakti Wahyu Trenggono, Indonesia’s fisheries minister, said in a statement at the meeting, according to the meeting’s official report viewed by Mongabay. Indonesia’s fleet has been cited for compliance-related issues — not following the fishery’s rules — which other parties raised as an issue in the discussion over the country’s share. While much attention at the meeting was on Indonesia’s request, the parties also dealt with other matters. They kept the total allowable catch (TAC) for all parties the same for 2026 as 2025, and they agreed to once again fully fund a key stock monitoring program. They also set up a future meeting for discussion of seabird protection in the fishery. There are more than a dozen regional fisheries management organizations (RFMOs) in the world, with some overlapping geographically but managing&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/10/indonesia-falls-short-in-bid-to-increase-its-share-of-southern-bluefin-tuna-catch/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/10/indonesia-falls-short-in-bid-to-increase-its-share-of-southern-bluefin-tuna-catch/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-307759</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>How will fisheries change in a hotter world? Experts share</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/08/how-will-fisheries-change-in-a-hotter-world-experts-share/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/08/how-will-fisheries-change-in-a-hotter-world-experts-share/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>13 Aug 2025 20:40:24 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Claudia Geib]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Jeremy Hance]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/08/13104006/Banc_de_thons_albacores_Thunnus_albacares_Ifremer_00568-68027_-_25195-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=304197</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Africa, Cameroon, Central Africa, Chad, Niger, Nigeria, Pacific Islands, and Pacific Ocean]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Aquaculture, Climate Change, Climate Justice, Conservation, Ecosystems, Environment, Fish, Fisheries, Fishing, Global Environmental Crisis, Global Warming, Hunger, Marine Protected Areas, Ocean Warming, Oceans, Overfishing, Poverty, Saltwater Fish, Tuna, and Water]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Lake Chad is nearly 1,130 kilometers (700 miles) from the ocean, but Nwamaka Okeke-Ogbuafor fears it is a preview of what’s ahead for African and other tropical fisheries. Straddling four countries on the southern edge of the Sahara Desert, Lake Chad began drying up dramatically during a series of droughts in the 1970s and ‘80s. [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Lake Chad is nearly 1,130 kilometers (700 miles) from the ocean, but Nwamaka Okeke-Ogbuafor fears it is a preview of what’s ahead for African and other tropical fisheries. Straddling four countries on the southern edge of the Sahara Desert, Lake Chad began drying up dramatically during a series of droughts in the 1970s and ‘80s. While the lake stopped shrinking in the 1990s — and it appears to be stable or even growing over the last 20 years — many fishing communities on the lake never recovered. Facing poverty and starvation, some former fishers and their families live in U.N.-funded camps for displaced people, which are running out of aid. Some struck out for a new life in other countries. Others joined Boko Haram, an Islamic insurgency organization, in a final act of desperation. “Communities are no longer cohesive — it’s a total disaster,” says Okeke-Ogbuafor, a marine social scientist focusing on tropical African fisheries. “It’s not just about food poverty, it’s the erosion of community and cultural knowledge.” Fish provide essential protein for an estimated 3.2 billion people across the world. In some developing tropical countries, fish can make up some 70% of the diet. But over the next 50 years, warming waters are certain to upend fishing communities — and rewrite the rules of ecosystems and industries worldwide. Mongabay asked five experts how fisheries will change by 2075, and what solutions could help prevent the worst outcomes. Women in Sierra Leone selling fish at the market in Mama&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/08/how-will-fisheries-change-in-a-hotter-world-experts-share/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/08/how-will-fisheries-change-in-a-hotter-world-experts-share/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-304197</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Bumble Bee asks court to dismiss lawsuit alleging forced labor in tuna supply chain</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/06/bumble-bee-asks-court-to-dismiss-lawsuit-alleging-forced-labor-in-tuna-supply-chain/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/06/bumble-bee-asks-court-to-dismiss-lawsuit-alleging-forced-labor-in-tuna-supply-chain/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>06 Jun 2025 16:26:41 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Basten Gokkon]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Rebecca Kessler]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Food systems]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/06/06123302/tuna-in-taiwan-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=300315</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Global, North America, and United States]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Business, Certification, Conflict, Conservation, Crime, Environment, Environmental Law, Fish, Fisheries, Fishing, Food, Food Industry, Forced labor, Governance, Human Rights, Industry, Marine Conservation, Oceans, Saltwater Fish, Slavery, Social Justice, Sustainability, and Tuna]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[U.S. canned tuna producer Bumble Bee Foods has asked a court to dismiss a lawsuit alleging that it knowingly benefited from its suppliers’ use of forced labor by Indonesian workers. Earlier this year, four Indonesian men filed a complaint in federal court in San Diego, California, against Bumble Bee, alleging the company was aware of [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[U.S. canned tuna producer Bumble Bee Foods has asked a court to dismiss a lawsuit alleging that it knowingly benefited from its suppliers’ use of forced labor by Indonesian workers. Earlier this year, four Indonesian men filed a complaint in federal court in San Diego, California, against Bumble Bee, alleging the company was aware of and profited from labor abuses and forced labor that they and other migrant sea workers endured aboard fishing vessels supplying the iconic U.S. tuna brand. On June 2, the company submitted a motion to the court to dismiss the case on legal grounds in an effort to end it before it reaches trial. In the motion, the company argued the plaintiffs lack standing for their claims, that they failed to state a proper claim under the law in question, and that the court lacks jurisdiction over certain aspects of the case. “Plaintiffs allege horrible mistreatment at the hands of vessel captains and crew on distant-water fishing vessels owned by two Chinese companies, operating in international waters, that supplied albacore tuna to Bumble Bee Foods, LLC (Bumble Bee),” the company stated in the motion. “Bumble Bee unequivocally condemns forced labor and takes allegations of forced labor in its supply chain seriously. Indeed, when Bumble Bee learned of the allegations in the Complaint, it promptly instructed its suppliers to cease purchasing from the vessels at issue. Plaintiffs nonetheless seek to hold Bumble Bee—a U.S. company—liable under the Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act (TVPRA) and state negligence law&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/06/bumble-bee-asks-court-to-dismiss-lawsuit-alleging-forced-labor-in-tuna-supply-chain/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/06/bumble-bee-asks-court-to-dismiss-lawsuit-alleging-forced-labor-in-tuna-supply-chain/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-300315</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Tuna fishing devices drift through a third of oceans, harming corals, coasts: Study</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/05/tuna-fishing-devices-drift-through-a-third-of-oceans-harming-corals-coasts-study/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/05/tuna-fishing-devices-drift-through-a-third-of-oceans-harming-corals-coasts-study/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>28 May 2025 07:03:53 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Keith Anthony Fabro]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Rebecca Kessler]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/05/27101218/FAD-North-Padre_Jace-Tunnell-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=299695</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Indian Ocean and Pacific Ocean]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Biodiversity, Conservation, Coral Reefs, Ecosystems, Environment, Environmental Law, Fish, Fisheries, Fishing, Food Industry, Habitat Loss, Marine, Marine Conservation, Oceans, Overfishing, Research, and Tuna]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[A recent study reveals that drifting fish aggregating devices (dFADs), widely used in tuna fishing, have spread to more than a third of the world’s oceans.  These devices harm ocean life and coastal communities, but weak rules and lack of accountability make it hard to manage them properly, some conservationists say. The study, published in [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[A recent study reveals that drifting fish aggregating devices (dFADs), widely used in tuna fishing, have spread to more than a third of the world’s oceans.  These devices harm ocean life and coastal communities, but weak rules and lack of accountability make it hard to manage them properly, some conservationists say. The study, published in May in Science Advances, estimates tuna boats deployed 1.41 million dFADs between 2007 and 2021. They drifted through the waters of 157 countries and across at least 134 million square kilometers (nearly 52 million square miles) — about 37% of the world’s oceans. Many were lost at sea and stranded in 104 maritime jurisdictions, the study showed, polluting coastlines and harming marine habitats. “Stranded dFADs can cause local habitat loss and pollution, especially where they involve the use of plastic netting, which is now being phased out,” study co-author Boris Worm, a marine ecologist at Dalhousie University in Nova Scotia, Canada, told Mongabay via email. “Cleaning up stranded dFADs can be very costly, and so far no progress has been made to make companies liable for the damage their devices cause.” Stranded dFads dFADs are floating rafts with underwater netting used by tuna purse seiners to attract skipjack, yellowfin and bigeye tuna (Katsuwonus pelamis, Thunnus albacares and T. obesus). The tuna school around such floating objects in pursuit of the prey that gather in their shade. One vessel can deploy hundreds of dFADs annually. Fitted with GPS and echo-sounder buoys, they drift with currents for&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/05/tuna-fishing-devices-drift-through-a-third-of-oceans-harming-corals-coasts-study/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/05/tuna-fishing-devices-drift-through-a-third-of-oceans-harming-corals-coasts-study/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-299695</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Tuna talks bring wins for Indian Ocean sharks, but more needed, experts say</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/05/tuna-talks-bring-wins-for-indian-ocean-sharks-but-more-needed-experts-say/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/05/tuna-talks-bring-wins-for-indian-ocean-sharks-but-more-needed-experts-say/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>01 May 2025 15:11:06 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Malavika Vyawahare]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Rebecca Kessler]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/05/01120001/whale-shark-768x512.jpeg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=298467</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Who controls Indian Ocean tuna?]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Indian Ocean]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Biodiversity, Bycatch, Conservation, Endangered Species, Environment, Environmental Policy, Fisheries, Fishing, Marine, Marine Animals, Overfishing, Regulations, Sharks, Tuna, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[SAINT-DENIS, La Réunion — The intergovernmental body that regulates tuna fisheries in the Indian Ocean agreed to a suite of shark conservation measures, including rules to curb shark finning and the use of gear that causes significant shark bycatch. The new measures adopted by the Indian Ocean Tuna Commission (IOTC) provide critical relief for a [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[SAINT-DENIS, La Réunion — The intergovernmental body that regulates tuna fisheries in the Indian Ocean agreed to a suite of shark conservation measures, including rules to curb shark finning and the use of gear that causes significant shark bycatch. The new measures adopted by the Indian Ocean Tuna Commission (IOTC) provide critical relief for a range of beleaguered shark species, but they may not be enough for some species, observers say. “Sharks won for the very first time at the IOTC except the shortfin mako,” Iris Ziegler, head of fisheries policies and ocean advocacy at the German Foundation for Marine Conservation, told Mongabay. “For shortfin mako, it was a disaster. We are overexploiting the species, and it may never recover.” The IOTC is a regional fisheries management organization (RFMO) responsible for overseeing fishing of 16 species of tuna and highly migratory tuna-adjacent species like mackerel, billfish and swordfish. The body held its 29th session in Saint-Denis, La Réunion, an overseas department of France, April 13-17. On the meeting’s agenda were a range of decisions related to conservation and management of the targeted tuna and tuna-like species. This year, shark conservation proposals featured prominently in the talks. An overlap in the aquatic habitats of sharks and tuna means that tuna fisheries capture a significant number of the threatened fish accidentally, as “bycatch.” Sturdy as they appear, sharks are very vulnerable to overfishing. They grow and mature more slowly than other marine animals; for example, female shortfin makos (Isurus oxyrinchus) take nearly&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/05/tuna-talks-bring-wins-for-indian-ocean-sharks-but-more-needed-experts-say/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/05/tuna-talks-bring-wins-for-indian-ocean-sharks-but-more-needed-experts-say/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-298467</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Panama conducts large illegal fishing bust in protected Pacific waters</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/03/panama-conducts-large-illegal-fishing-bust-in-protected-pacific-waters/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/03/panama-conducts-large-illegal-fishing-bust-in-protected-pacific-waters/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>28 Mar 2025 14:25:26 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Edward Carver]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Rebecca Kessler]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/03/28135933/OceanImageBank_NicolasJob_6-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=296649</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Central America, North America, Pacific Ocean, and Panama]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Business, Crime, Environment, Environmental Law, Fish, Fisheries, Fishing, Food, Food Industry, Governance, Illegal Fishing, Illegal Trade, Industry, Marine, Marine Conservation, Marine Protected Areas, Mongabay investigation, Oceans, Overfishing, Politics, Saltwater Fish, Surveillance, and Tuna]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Panamanian authorities seized six longliner vessels on Jan. 20 for fishing illegally in protected waters. They also opened an investigation into an additional 10 vessels that surveillance data showed had apparently been fishing in the area but left by the time authorities arrived. The seizures took place in the Cordillera de Coiba, a marine protected [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Panamanian authorities seized six longliner vessels on Jan. 20 for fishing illegally in protected waters. They also opened an investigation into an additional 10 vessels that surveillance data showed had apparently been fishing in the area but left by the time authorities arrived. The seizures took place in the Cordillera de Coiba, a marine protected area that’s part of the Eastern Tropical Pacific Marine Corridor, which connects several MPAs in four countries. It was the largest illegal fishing bust in the history of Panama’s MPAs, according to a government press release. “This was big news, and it came as a surprise for everyone,” Annissamyd Del Cid, the Panama national coordinator at WildAid, a San Fransisco-based NGO, told Mongabay. The group has worked in the Eastern Tropical Pacific since 2010, including helping to bolster authorities’ monitoring capacities, and works with the Panamanian government to help protect the Cordillera de Coiba. The fishing vessels, whose activity is still under investigation, were Panamanian-flagged, meaning they were registered in the country. But no identifying information has been released publicly, so the nationality of the owners isn’t clear. Panama serves as a major “flag of convenience” state, used by vessel owners around the world, often to avoid stricter regulations elsewhere. Panamanian authorities detected the first entry into the MPA on Jan. 10. In the days that followed, three state agencies — the National Aeronaval Service (SENAN), the Aquatic Resources Authority of Panama (ARAP), and the Ministry of Environment — used aerial and satellite-based surveillance to&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/03/panama-conducts-large-illegal-fishing-bust-in-protected-pacific-waters/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/03/panama-conducts-large-illegal-fishing-bust-in-protected-pacific-waters/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-296649</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Rep from American Samoa calls for opening protected Pacific waters to tuna fishing</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/03/rep-from-american-samoa-calls-for-opening-protected-pacific-waters-to-tuna-fishing/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/03/rep-from-american-samoa-calls-for-opening-protected-pacific-waters-to-tuna-fishing/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>19 Mar 2025 16:48:27 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Edward Carver]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Rebecca Kessler]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2022/06/18005049/14981581864_6b771acf13_o-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=296065</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[United States]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Biodiversity, Conservation, Environment, Fish, Fishing, Food Industry, Industry, Marine Protected Areas, Overfishing, Protected Areas, Saltwater Fish, and Tuna]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[U.S. Congresswoman Amata Radewagen, who represents American Samoa, has urged the Trump administration to reopen most of an enormous marine protected area in the Central Pacific Ocean to industrial fishing while also recommending the reopening of other Pacific MPAs. In a Jan. 23 letter to President Donald Trump, Radewagen called for his administration to open [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[U.S. Congresswoman Amata Radewagen, who represents American Samoa, has urged the Trump administration to reopen most of an enormous marine protected area in the Central Pacific Ocean to industrial fishing while also recommending the reopening of other Pacific MPAs. In a Jan. 23 letter to President Donald Trump, Radewagen called for his administration to open the vast majority of the Pacific Islands Heritage Marine National Monument (PIH) to commercial tuna fishing. PIH, which is larger than the U.S. state of Texas, is an area of exceptional biodiversity. Radewagen’s letter called reopening it an “immediate need” that would benefit the country’s economy and challenge “Chinese fishing dominance.” She also sent Trump a background document that, among other requests, called for an executive order to open all Pacific marine national monuments and national marine sanctuaries to tuna fishing and to withdraw the U.S. from efforts to develop large marine protected areas in international waters. Some details of the letter and background document, which Radewagen’s office shared with Mongabay, have not previously been publicly reported. Members of the PIH Coalition, an advocacy group based in Hawai‘i that includes scientists, fishers and Indigenous leaders, criticized Radewagen’s move. “I think it&#8217;s foolish,” Rick Gaffney, a PIH Coalition member and fisheries expert, told Mongabay. Gaffney said conservationists have been fighting to ensure a future for fisheries in the Pacific, which is why MPAs like PIH were created: “to be sure that these extremely remote and unique island areas are protected so that they continue to be&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/03/rep-from-american-samoa-calls-for-opening-protected-pacific-waters-to-tuna-fishing/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-296065</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Study finds signs of tuna abundance outside marine protected areas</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/03/study-finds-signs-of-tuna-abundance-outside-marine-protected-areas/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/03/study-finds-signs-of-tuna-abundance-outside-marine-protected-areas/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>03 Mar 2025 22:58:29 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Edward Carver]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Rebecca Kessler]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/03/03212656/3.jpg-768x512-1.png" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=295235</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Galapagos, Hawaii, Indian Ocean, Kiribati, Mexico, and Pacific Ocean]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Environment, Fisheries, Fishing, Marine Conservation, Marine Protected Areas, and Tuna]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[There&#8217;s solid evidence that well-enforced marine protected areas (MPAs) that prohibit fishing benefit a wide variety of species within their borders. However, the impact outside their borders is a matter of debate, especially when it comes to highly sought tuna species. Experts differ about how much tuna can “spill over” from an area closed to [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[There&#8217;s solid evidence that well-enforced marine protected areas (MPAs) that prohibit fishing benefit a wide variety of species within their borders. However, the impact outside their borders is a matter of debate, especially when it comes to highly sought tuna species. Experts differ about how much tuna can “spill over” from an area closed to industrial fishing and be caught in the sea beyond. Recent research published in the journal Science indicates that large-scale MPAs do generate spillover. The study found that purse seiner fishing vessels catch 12-18% more tuna per unit of effort in the 100 nautical miles (185 kilometers) surrounding large MPAs than they would if the areas hadn’t been closed to fishing. “There&#8217;s some arguments that protected areas are kind of ineffectual compared to other forms of fisheries management,” John Lynham, a marine economist at the University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa who co-authored the study, told Mongabay. “So, I think we&#8217;re contributing to some of that debate. And then really big picture, I think what we&#8217;ve found certainly provides evidence in favor of one day trying to have large MPAs on the high seas.” The next few years could see an expansion of MPAs not just in national but also in international waters once a 2023 international agreement known as the High Seas Treaty takes effect. The effort is fueled largely by a separate 2022 agreement to scale up MPA coverage to 30% of the oceans’ surface area by 2030 — “30&#215;30,” as it’s known. Fully enacting&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/03/study-finds-signs-of-tuna-abundance-outside-marine-protected-areas/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/03/study-finds-signs-of-tuna-abundance-outside-marine-protected-areas/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-295235</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Report: Illegal fishing and labor abuse rampant in China’s Indian Ocean fleet</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2024/06/report-illegal-fishing-and-labor-abuse-rampant-in-chinas-indian-ocean-fleet/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2024/06/report-illegal-fishing-and-labor-abuse-rampant-in-chinas-indian-ocean-fleet/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>06 Jun 2024 19:57:07 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Elizabeth Claire Alberts]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Rebecca Kessler]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Food systems]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2024/06/06152540/4618615523_9e60dc0e59_o-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=283013</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, China, and Indian Ocean]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Biodiversity, Conservation, Crime, Environment, Environmental Law, Fish, Fishing, Food Industry, Forced labor, Global Environmental Crisis, Governance, Illegal Fishing, Marine, Marine Conservation, Natural Resources, Oceans, Organized Crime, Overfishing, Politics, Social Justice, and Tuna]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[The Chinese distant-water fishing fleet is a formidable force. For one thing, it’s the largest in the world, with at least 2,500 vessels — but likely many more. These vessels, many of which are propped up by government subsidies, are present in all of the world’s major oceans and countless coastal areas. The fleet’s sheer [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[The Chinese distant-water fishing fleet is a formidable force. For one thing, it’s the largest in the world, with at least 2,500 vessels — but likely many more. These vessels, many of which are propped up by government subsidies, are present in all of the world’s major oceans and countless coastal areas. The fleet’s sheer size and geographical span means it takes a sizeable volume of marine fish out of the sea: an estimated 4 million metric tons yearly. Experts say the Chinese distant-water fleet also participates in a disproportionate amount of illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing and exploitative practices such as shark finning and human rights violations. Previous reporting on these issues has usually focused on parts of the world such as the coastal waters of West Africa, or around the exclusive economic zones (EEZs) of Latin American countries like Ecuador and Argentina, where the Chinese distant-water fleet has drawn attention and stirred controversy. However, a recent report by the Environmental Justice Foundation (EJF), a U.K.-based nonprofit organization, highlights the illegal and unsustainable activities of the Chinese distant-water fleet in the Southwest Indian Ocean, a global hotspot for marine biodiversity and home to commercially important tuna species like yellowfin (Thunnus albacares), skipjack (Katsuwonus pelamis) and bigeye (Thunnus obesus). Published in April, the EJF report draws primarily from crew testimonials to paint a grim picture of the Chinese distant-water fleet behaving badly in the seas off the coast of East Africa. They describe illegal shark-finning operations, with crew cutting&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2024/06/report-illegal-fishing-and-labor-abuse-rampant-in-chinas-indian-ocean-fleet/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2024/06/report-illegal-fishing-and-labor-abuse-rampant-in-chinas-indian-ocean-fleet/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-283013</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>No mercy for overfished yellowfin tuna at Indian Ocean fisheries meeting</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2024/05/no-mercy-for-overfished-yellowfin-tuna-at-indian-ocean-fisheries-meeting/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2024/05/no-mercy-for-overfished-yellowfin-tuna-at-indian-ocean-fisheries-meeting/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>23 May 2024 13:54:22 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Francesco De Augustinis]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Rebecca Kessler]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2024/05/23130842/5187510861_7dce498c9c_o-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=282437</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Indian Ocean]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Biodiversity, Conservation, Environment, Environmental Law, Environmental Policy, Fish, Fisheries, Fishing, Food, Food Industry, Governance, Industry, Marine, Marine Conservation, Oceans, Overfishing, Saltwater Fish, Supply Chain, Sustainability, Trade, and Tuna]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Although yellowfin tuna comprises almost one-third of the global tuna catch, in the Indian Ocean it’s been declared overfished for the past nine years and scientists have described the stock as being “in critical condition.” Yet countries failed to reach any agreement to reduce catches of yellowfin (Thunnus albacares) at the closely watched recent meeting [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Although yellowfin tuna comprises almost one-third of the global tuna catch, in the Indian Ocean it’s been declared overfished for the past nine years and scientists have described the stock as being “in critical condition.” Yet countries failed to reach any agreement to reduce catches of yellowfin (Thunnus albacares) at the closely watched recent meeting of the Indian Ocean Tuna Commission, the intergovernmental body that regulates fishing for tuna and tuna-like species in the region. Delegates did, however, adopt the first management measures for skipjack tuna (Katsuwonus pelamis) and swordfish (Xiphias gladius) fisheries, and took steps to rein in controversial fish aggregating devices (FADs), largely used by European purse seine vessels, which represent the biggest tuna fleet in the Indian Ocean. “The EU welcomes the important decisions reached during the 28th annual meeting of the Indian Ocean Tuna Commission (IOTC), which will make fisheries in the Indian Ocean more sustainable,” the European Commission wrote in a press release, highlighting agreements reached on FADs. The Maldives, whose fleet mainly catches skipjack and yellowfin, also welcomed the overall outcome of the meeting, praising “the hard work” of the delegations of South Africa, Indonesia, South Korea, the EU, Pakistan, Mauritius and Seychelles to get the FAD measure adopted: “Maldives is pleased that after years of intense negotiations and setbacks, a drifting FAD (dFAD) management measure was adopted,” the Maldives’ Ministry of Fisheries and Ocean Resources posted on X at the meeting’s conclusion. Observers from some conservation NGOs commented less enthusiastically about the IOTC&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2024/05/no-mercy-for-overfished-yellowfin-tuna-at-indian-ocean-fisheries-meeting/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-282437</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Critics push for more transparency at RFMOs that govern high seas fishing</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2024/01/critics-push-for-more-transparency-at-rfmos-that-govern-high-seas-fishing/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2024/01/critics-push-for-more-transparency-at-rfmos-that-govern-high-seas-fishing/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>31 Jan 2024 17:09:43 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Edward Carver]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Rebecca Kessler]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Food systems]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2023/10/23151556/tuna-fishing-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=278230</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Global]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Conservation, Crime, Ecosystems, Environment, Environmental Law, Environmental Policy, Fish, Fisheries, Fishing, Global Environmental Crisis, Governance, Illegal Fishing, International Trade, Journalism, Law, Marine, Marine Conservation, Oceans, Overconsumption, Overfishing, Politics, and Tuna]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[The organization responsible for managing the catch of more than half the world’s tuna holds a key section of its annual compliance meeting in secret. For three days, a committee of the Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission (WCPFC) assesses how well member states are following fishing rules, without any outside observers present. The WCPFC says [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[The organization responsible for managing the catch of more than half the world’s tuna holds a key section of its annual compliance meeting in secret. For three days, a committee of the Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission (WCPFC) assesses how well member states are following fishing rules, without any outside observers present. The WCPFC says the meeting is closed for technical reasons, not to hide bad behavior. But critics contend this raises the possibility that countries with bad-acting vessels operating under their flag may avoid public scrutiny. Regional fisheries management organizations (RFMOs) like the WCPFC, which manage fishing in international waters, or the “high seas,” should be accountable to everyone, according to environmental advocates who are making an increasingly vociferous case for RFMOs to become more transparent. RFMOs are, after all, in charge of shared public resources. Yet the public doesn’t always get a seat at the table: many RFMOs block access to journalists and even to NGO observers during sensitive meetings. When observers are allowed in to RFMO meetings, they’re sometimes restricted in what they can say publicly, especially in real time, as decisions are being made. RFMOs issue reports after meetings, but few explain how parties voted or what positions they took during negotiations. “When an RFMO puts out a report, it doesn’t say, ‘Country X torpedoed this proposal,’” Ryan Orgera, global director of Accountability.Fish, a Virginia-based advocacy group, told Mongabay. “It simply says, ‘consensus was not reached.’” The lack of detailed information makes it difficult for reformers&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2024/01/critics-push-for-more-transparency-at-rfmos-that-govern-high-seas-fishing/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2024/01/critics-push-for-more-transparency-at-rfmos-that-govern-high-seas-fishing/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-278230</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Indonesia invites Turkish investors to develop tuna farms in Papua</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2024/01/indonesia-turkiye-tuna-investment-fish-farm-fisheries-japan/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2024/01/indonesia-turkiye-tuna-investment-fish-farm-fisheries-japan/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>30 Jan 2024 09:41:01 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Basten Gokkon]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Basten Gokkon]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2024/01/29075924/WhatsApp-Image-2024-01-28-at-09.33.27-768x512.jpeg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=278108</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Indonesia, New Guinea, Papua, Papua New Guinea, Southeast Asia, and Turkey]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Aquaculture, Coastal Ecosystems, Conservation, Environment, Environmental Policy, Fish, Fisheries, Fishing, Governance, Green, Illegal Fishing, Lakes, Marine, Marine Conservation, Oceans, Overfishing, Saltwater Fish, Sustainability, Trade, and Tuna]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[JAKARTA — The Indonesian government has invited Turkish investors to help develop an offshore tuna farm in the country’s eastern Papua region, which it aims to turn into a major tuna export hub. The move is the latest outreach by Indonesia’s fisheries ministry to other countries to invest in and develop its fisheries potential. Earlier [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[JAKARTA — The Indonesian government has invited Turkish investors to help develop an offshore tuna farm in the country’s eastern Papua region, which it aims to turn into a major tuna export hub. The move is the latest outreach by Indonesia’s fisheries ministry to other countries to invest in and develop its fisheries potential. Earlier in January, the minister made a similar offer to Vietnam to invest in lobster farming. On a recent visit to Türkiye, the Indonesian fisheries minister, Sakti Wahyu Trenggono, said Turkish investment and aquaculture technology could help kick-start tuna farming in the waters of Biak Numfor district in Papua province. The minister spoke at a fish-fattening farm in the Türkiye’s Gulf of İzmir, where various marine fish species, including Atlantic bluefin tuna (Thunnus thynnus), are held in pens after being captured from the wild and fed to increase their weight. “Some of our territorial waters are habitat for tuna, so we need innovation to increase the productivity of this commodity and ensure its sustainability,&#8221; Trenggono said in a statement published Jan. 24. Indonesian fisheries minister Sakti Wahyu Trenggono visits a tuna farm in the Gulf of İzmir, Türkiye. Image courtesy of the Indonesian Ministry of Marine Affairs and Fisheries. At the start of his second term in office, in 2019, President Joko Widodo ordered the fisheries ministry to boost the country’s aquaculture productivity. Indonesia’s tuna fishery is an important source of livelihood for coastal communities in the Southeast Asian nation and a key source of food&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2024/01/indonesia-turkiye-tuna-investment-fish-farm-fisheries-japan/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2024/01/indonesia-turkiye-tuna-investment-fish-farm-fisheries-japan/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-278108</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Report shines partial light on worst labor offenders in opaque fishing industry</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2023/11/report-shines-partial-light-on-worst-labor-offenders-in-opaque-fishing-industry/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2023/11/report-shines-partial-light-on-worst-labor-offenders-in-opaque-fishing-industry/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>21 Nov 2023 21:31:13 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Edward Carver]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Rebecca Kessler]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2023/11/21210706/GP0STQO6M_Medium_res_with_credit_line-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=275737</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Africa, Asia, China, Europe, Global, Senegal, and West Africa]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Biodiversity, Crime, Ecosystems, Environment, Fish, Fishing, Forced labor, Governance, Illegal Fishing, Law Enforcement, Marine, Marine Animals, Oceans, Tuna, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[In recent years, labor issues on industrial fishing vessels have received increased attention, commanding headlines in prominent media outlets. Terrible working and living conditions — even forced labor — are commonplace, especially on distant-water fleets that ply the high seas and the waters of foreign countries. And yet ship owners are rarely held to account. [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[In recent years, labor issues on industrial fishing vessels have received increased attention, commanding headlines in prominent media outlets. Terrible working and living conditions — even forced labor — are commonplace, especially on distant-water fleets that ply the high seas and the waters of foreign countries. And yet ship owners are rarely held to account. One reason? It’s hard to identify who they are. The industry is so opaque that it’s not possible to identify the beneficial owners — that is, the human beings who ultimately take in the profits — for the vast majority of vessels on which forced labor has been suspected, according to a new report from the Financial Transparency Coalition (FTC), a consortium of international NGOs. The FTC found cases of reported forced labor on 475 vessels since 2010, but could only identify the beneficial owners, or even an individual who represents them, for 20% of those vessels. Industrial actors regularly use shell companies and complex transnational joint venture structures that obscure vessels’ true ownership. “To me it’s like mining was back in the 1990s before any transparency initiatives,” Matti Kohonen, the FTC’s executive director and a co-author of the report, told Mongabay, referring to the fishing industry. At least 128,000 fishers are trapped in forced labor at sea, the International Labour Organization (ILO), a UN agency, estimates. The coercive practice takes many forms. The ILO’s indicators of forced labor include holding crew members’ identity documents, withholding wages, debt bondage, abusive conditions, violence, and intimidation. The&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2023/11/report-shines-partial-light-on-worst-labor-offenders-in-opaque-fishing-industry/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2023/11/report-shines-partial-light-on-worst-labor-offenders-in-opaque-fishing-industry/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-275737</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Report: Half of MSC-certified ‘sustainable’ tuna caught with controversial gear</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2023/10/report-half-of-msc-certified-sustainable-tuna-caught-with-controversial-gear/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2023/10/report-half-of-msc-certified-sustainable-tuna-caught-with-controversial-gear/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>24 Oct 2023 18:47:25 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Shreya Dasgupta]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Rebecca Kessler]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2023/10/23151556/tuna-fishing-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=274521</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Global]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Business, Community Development, Conflict, Conservation, Environment, Environmental Law, Fish, Fisheries, Fishing, Food Industry, Governance, Human Rights, Illegal Fishing, Illegal Trade, International Trade, Law, Law Enforcement, Marine, Marine Conservation, Natural Resources, Oceans, Overfishing, Politics, Resource Conflict, Saltwater Fish, Sustainability, and Tuna]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[In November 2018, Pesqueras Echebastar, a Spanish tuna fishing company, received a certificate of sustainability from the London-based nonprofit Marine Stewardship Council, the world’s largest ecolabeling scheme for wild fisheries. This was the first time a purse seine fishery using fish aggregating devices (FADs) — a controversial fishing method — had been certified by the [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[In November 2018, Pesqueras Echebastar, a Spanish tuna fishing company, received a certificate of sustainability from the London-based nonprofit Marine Stewardship Council, the world’s largest ecolabeling scheme for wild fisheries. This was the first time a purse seine fishery using fish aggregating devices (FADs) — a controversial fishing method — had been certified by the MSC. Since then, the number of MSC-certified tuna fisheries using FADs has soared, according to a recent report by France-based nonprofit BLOOM Association. “It’s a massive issue because FADs have not become sustainable,” Frédéric Le Manach, BLOOM’s scientific director and the author of the report, told Mongabay in an email. “It’s just the MSC standards and the way they are applied by certifiers that have gotten even weaker.” The MSC’s senior PR manager, Susannah Henty, disagreed with the report’s findings. “We strongly refute the false and misinformed claims made by Bloom, which has a long running campaign against commercial fishing,” she told Mongabay in an email. “Fisheries obtain MSC certification by meeting a set of strict criteria on their environmental impact — only the highest-scoring fisheries will gain certification &#8230; Destructive fisheries cannot be certified as sustainable to the MSC Fisheries Standard.” French purse seiner vessel Trevignon hauls a catch of skipjack and yellowfin tuna associated with a fish aggregating device (FAD) in the Mozambique Channel. Image © Jiri Rezac / Greenpeace. Three purse seiners docked in American Samoa. Image by Ted McGrath via Flickr (CC BY-NC-SA 2.0). A magnet for fish Fishers have long&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2023/10/report-half-of-msc-certified-sustainable-tuna-caught-with-controversial-gear/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2023/10/report-half-of-msc-certified-sustainable-tuna-caught-with-controversial-gear/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-274521</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Madagascar signs new ‘sustainable’ tuna deal with the EU</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2023/08/madagascar-signs-new-sustainable-tuna-deal-with-the-eu/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2023/08/madagascar-signs-new-sustainable-tuna-deal-with-the-eu/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>07 Aug 2023 16:12:01 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Edward Carver]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Rebecca Kessler]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[africa]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2023/08/04154707/madagascar-fishing-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=271839</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Africa, East Africa, Indian Ocean, and Madagascar]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Business, Community Development, Conflict, Conservation, Environment, Environmental Law, Fish, Fisheries, Fishing, Food Industry, Governance, Human Rights, Illegal Fishing, Illegal Trade, International Trade, Law, Law Enforcement, Marine, Marine Conservation, Natural Resources, Oceans, Overfishing, Politics, Resource Conflict, Saltwater Fish, and Tuna]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Foreign tuna fishing companies, mostly from Asia, have been exploiting Madagascar’s waters since the 1950s. The bloc that is now the European Union joined the hunt in 1986 and didn’t stop for decades, renewing its deal with Madagascar every few years. Yet when the last Sustainable Fisheries Partnership Agreement (SFPA), as the deals are now [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Foreign tuna fishing companies, mostly from Asia, have been exploiting Madagascar’s waters since the 1950s. The bloc that is now the European Union joined the hunt in 1986 and didn’t stop for decades, renewing its deal with Madagascar every few years. Yet when the last Sustainable Fisheries Partnership Agreement (SFPA), as the deals are now called, expired at the end of 2018, negotiations on a new one had reached a standstill — and there they remained. For four and a half years, no vessels flagged to EU countries could fish in Madagascar’s waters. Finally, in late June, Madagascar and the EU signed a new SFPA. The EU says the deal benefits Madagascar by providing key funding for fisheries governance, and civil society groups praised the Madagascar government for creating a more inclusive and transparent negotiating process than in the past. However, critics argue that the deal benefits neither the Malagasy people nor the European public to a large degree, but rather a narrow set of private interests: fishing companies. They point out that the regional tuna fishery manager has declared two of the three main commercial tuna species in the Indian Ocean as &#8220;overfished&#8221; and fleets have long fished the third well beyond catch limits, and they say the EU will merely be adding to the overexploitation. “[H]ow can the EU continue to brand their agreements ‘sustainable’ in the region, with … yellowfin overfished since 2015, bigeye overfished since 2022, and skipjack fished way over scientific advice for years,” Frédéric Le Manach, scientific&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2023/08/madagascar-signs-new-sustainable-tuna-deal-with-the-eu/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2023/08/madagascar-signs-new-sustainable-tuna-deal-with-the-eu/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-271839</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Indonesia to cut tuna harvest in bid for more sustainable fishery</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2023/06/indonesia-tuna-fisheries-catch-sustainable-fishing-strategy-management/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2023/06/indonesia-tuna-fisheries-catch-sustainable-fishing-strategy-management/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>21 Jun 2023 19:55:58 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Basten Gokkon]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Basten Gokkon]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2023/06/21120452/IMG_740FB2D85B27-1-768x512.jpeg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=270039</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Indonesia, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Certification, Corporate Social Responsibility, Environment, Environmental Policy, Fish, Fisheries, Fishing, Illegal Fishing, Marine, Marine Conservation, Oceans, Overfishing, Saltwater Fish, Sustainability, and Tuna]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[JAKARTA — The Indonesian government says it will reduce its annual tuna catch, the world’s largest, by a tenth in an effort to sustain the future of the fisheries. The Indonesian fisheries ministry earlier this month published its harvest strategy paper showing that it will progressively cut its tuna catch volume by 10% of the [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[JAKARTA — The Indonesian government says it will reduce its annual tuna catch, the world’s largest, by a tenth in an effort to sustain the future of the fisheries. The Indonesian fisheries ministry earlier this month published its harvest strategy paper showing that it will progressively cut its tuna catch volume by 10% of the 2021 level over the course of three years. It cited depleting populations of skipjack tuna (Katsuwonus pelamis) and yellowfin tuna (Thunnus albacares) as justification for the move. The paper, which Mongabay has reviewed, says this strategy should “ideally” come into effect no later than 2026 as part of the implementation of the ministry’s quota-based and zone-based fisheries policy. A ministerial decree is also expected to be issued as the legal basis for the tuna harvest strategy, which provincial governments will then have to implement, according to officials. “The publication of this harvest strategy document embodies Indonesia’s sovereignty and commitment to managing and ensuring the sustainability of tuna,” Sakti Wahyu Trenggono, the fisheries minister, said at a World Ocean Day event on June 9. Indonesian fisheries minister Sakti Wahyu Trenggono, left, and the ministry’s director for permits and fishers, Ukon Ahman Furqon, launch the tuna harvest strategy paper. Image courtesy of the Indonesian Ministry of Marine Affairs and Fisheries. Indonesia catches more tuna than any other country, accounting for about 16% of the world’s total tuna supply. In 2021 it produced 791,000 metric tons of tuna, including skipjack, yellowfin and mackerel tuna (Euthynnus affinis), with a&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2023/06/indonesia-tuna-fisheries-catch-sustainable-fishing-strategy-management/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2023/06/indonesia-tuna-fisheries-catch-sustainable-fishing-strategy-management/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-270039</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Indonesia looks into tuna farming to boost aquaculture, reduce overfishing</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2023/06/indonesia-looks-into-tuna-farming-to-boost-aquaculture-reduce-overfishing/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2023/06/indonesia-looks-into-tuna-farming-to-boost-aquaculture-reduce-overfishing/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>13 Jun 2023 07:34:24 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Basten Gokkon]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Basten Gokkon]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2022/05/11163923/Maluku-fisherman-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=269619</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Indonesia, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Aquaculture, Coastal Ecosystems, Conservation, Environment, Environmental Policy, Fish, Fisheries, Fishing, Governance, Green, Illegal Fishing, Lakes, Marine, Marine Conservation, Oceans, Overfishing, Saltwater Fish, Sustainability, Trade, and Tuna]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[LEGIAN, Indonesia — Indonesia is developing tuna farming in an effort to boost its aquaculture sector and lift some pressure from the world’s largest marine tuna fisheries. Indonesia catches more tuna than any other country, accounting for about 16% of the world’s total tuna supply. However, intensive fishing of wild tuna from the country’s waters [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[LEGIAN, Indonesia — Indonesia is developing tuna farming in an effort to boost its aquaculture sector and lift some pressure from the world’s largest marine tuna fisheries. Indonesia catches more tuna than any other country, accounting for about 16% of the world’s total tuna supply. However, intensive fishing of wild tuna from the country’s waters has made the fishery unsustainable, with much of Indonesia’s fishing grounds in the Pacific and Indian oceans already fully exploited, and many tuna species subject to overfishing. The Indonesian fisheries ministry has over the years rolled out a string of measures to keep tuna production at sustainable levels, including by introducing harvest controls, monitoring certain species in a few fisheries areas, managing the use of fish-aggregating devices, and encouraging the fishers to achieve international-standard sustainability certification. To expand on these measures, the ministry is now looking into establishing tuna farms in the country’s bays. “This can be a good thing if we can develop it in Indonesia,” Sakti Wahyu Trenggono, the fisheries minister, told reporters at a press conference May 24 in Legian, Bali. “No more massive tuna catching, but instead, an option is to catch them and then grow them for a certain period and give them high economic added value while also supplying protein demands.” An Indonesian tuna fisherman using an anchored fish-aggregating device, locally known as rumpon. Image courtesy of Yayasan Masyarakat dan Perikanan Indonesia. Sakti said catching wild tuna to be put into sea pens would require different skills and techniques&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2023/06/indonesia-looks-into-tuna-farming-to-boost-aquaculture-reduce-overfishing/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2023/06/indonesia-looks-into-tuna-farming-to-boost-aquaculture-reduce-overfishing/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-269619</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>As one Indian Ocean tuna stock faces collapse, nations scramble to save others</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2023/05/as-one-indian-ocean-tuna-stock-faces-collapse-nations-scramble-to-save-others/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2023/05/as-one-indian-ocean-tuna-stock-faces-collapse-nations-scramble-to-save-others/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>29 May 2023 15:12:24 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Malavika Vyawahare]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Rebecca Kessler]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Food systems]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2023/05/29144624/yellowfin-tuna-2-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=269157</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Who controls Indian Ocean tuna?]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Indian Ocean]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Biodiversity, Business, Conservation, Environment, Environmental Law, Environmental Policy, Fish, Fisheries, Fishing, Food, Food Industry, Governance, Industry, Marine, Marine Conservation, Oceans, Overfishing, Saltwater Fish, Supply Chain, Sustainability, Trade, and Tuna]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[The organization responsible for managing tuna fishing quotas in the Indian Ocean failed to make headway on saving the sector’s most imperiled species, yellowfin tuna (Thunnus albacares), at the body’s annual meeting this month. Members of the Indian Ocean Tuna Commission (IOTC) did, however, take steps to prevent another tuna stock, bigeye tuna (T. obesus), [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[The organization responsible for managing tuna fishing quotas in the Indian Ocean failed to make headway on saving the sector’s most imperiled species, yellowfin tuna (Thunnus albacares), at the body’s annual meeting this month. Members of the Indian Ocean Tuna Commission (IOTC) did, however, take steps to prevent another tuna stock, bigeye tuna (T. obesus), from going the yellowfin way. The end value of tuna fisheries from the Indian Ocean is around $8 billion annually, according to an analysis by US-based think tank The Pew Charitable Trusts. The gathering of IOTC parties, which include coastal states that border the Indian Ocean and distant-water fishing entities, most notably the European Union, was held in Mauritius from May 8-12. There was little progress on key issues surrounding yellowfin, like reducing annual catch for the overfished stock and limiting the use of harmful fish-aggregating devices (FADs) used by purse seine fishing vessels. Although the IOTC declared yellowfin tuna overfished in 2015, to date, the intergovernmental regional management body has failed to curb overfishing, particularly the capture of juveniles. The Indian Ocean yellowfin population could be headed for collapse as early as 2026, conservation group Planet Tracker says. “When it comes to yellowfin tuna, we are eating our capital,” Umair Shahid, WWF’s Indian Ocean tuna specialist, said in a statement. “Unless we take action now to radically reduce annual catch, there won’t be enough stock left to harvest in less than 10 years.” Yellowfin tuna (Thunnus albacares) caught by fishermen in Seychelles. The Indian&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2023/05/as-one-indian-ocean-tuna-stock-faces-collapse-nations-scramble-to-save-others/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2023/05/as-one-indian-ocean-tuna-stock-faces-collapse-nations-scramble-to-save-others/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-269157</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>U.S. grocery chains flunk sustainability, human rights tests for tuna sourcing</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2023/02/u-s-grocery-chains-flunk-sustainability-human-rights-tests-for-tuna-sourcing/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2023/02/u-s-grocery-chains-flunk-sustainability-human-rights-tests-for-tuna-sourcing/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>21 Feb 2023 12:00:51 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Monica Evans]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Rebecca Kessler]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Food systems]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2023/02/20131704/Frozen-Albacore-Tuna-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=265754</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Global, North America, and United States]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Business, Conflict, Conservation, Crime, Environment, Environmental Law, Fish, Fisheries, Fishing, Food, Food Industry, Forced labor, Governance, Human Rights, Illegal Fishing, Industry, Marine Conservation, Oceans, Overfishing, Saltwater Fish, Social Justice, Sustainability, and Tuna]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Canned tuna is trending in the U.S. again: after a tail-off in its consumption in the three decades through 2016, the cheap and shelf-stable protein’s popularity surged during the COVID-19 pandemic. Then, last year, it got a major boost from young foodie influencers on TikTok: apparently, tuna-based date nights have become a thing, with the [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Canned tuna is trending in the U.S. again: after a tail-off in its consumption in the three decades through 2016, the cheap and shelf-stable protein’s popularity surged during the COVID-19 pandemic. Then, last year, it got a major boost from young foodie influencers on TikTok: apparently, tuna-based date nights have become a thing, with the hashtag #tinnedfish gaining more than 26.5 million views on the social media app so far. Part of this resurgence has to do with the product’s supposed sustainability street cred: it’s often seen as an eco-friendly alternative to other animal proteins. But a new report by environmental NGO Greenpeace says that despite considerable progress, U.S. grocery chains still have a long way to go on addressing serious environmental and human rights concerns in their sourcing of tuna products. The U.S. is the world’s second-largest tuna importer and its retailers wield significant clout within the $42 billion global tuna sector, according to the report. Greenpeace has been ranking U.S. seafood retailers on sustainability criteria since 2008. This is the second such report to incorporate human rights considerations. The report’s authors compiled a scorecard for the 16 largest U.S. grocery retailers on their tuna sourcing practices. To do so, they sent out a survey, which 11 of the retailers completed and returned, and used publicly available information for the remaining five. They scored the retailers with percentage grades based on 39 questions across six categories: procurement policy; traceability; advocacy and initiatives; human rights and labor protections; current sourcing;&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2023/02/u-s-grocery-chains-flunk-sustainability-human-rights-tests-for-tuna-sourcing/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2023/02/u-s-grocery-chains-flunk-sustainability-human-rights-tests-for-tuna-sourcing/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-265754</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>End of the tuna FAD? Indonesia hopes so, but EU isn’t giving up just yet</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2023/02/indonesia-tuna-fishing-fisheries-indian-ocean-fads-eu-fish-aggregating-device/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2023/02/indonesia-tuna-fishing-fisheries-indian-ocean-fads-eu-fish-aggregating-device/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>20 Feb 2023 09:03:59 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Basten Gokkon]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Basten Gokkon]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2023/02/20073117/Aktivitas-nelayan-tuna-di-Obi-sekitar-rumpon-foto-MDPI-1-768x485.jpeg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=265733</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Europe, European Union, Indian Ocean, Indonesia, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Biodiversity, Conservation, Ecosystems, Fisheries, Fishing, Governance, In-situ Conservation, Marine, Marine Animals, Marine Conservation, Oceans, Overfishing, Saltwater Fish, Supply Chain, Sustainability, and Tuna]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[JAKARTA — The Indonesian government has welcomed a recent decision by fisheries regulators to curtail the use of controversial fish-aggregating devices, or FADs, which critics blame for a steep decline in Indian Ocean tuna stocks. “Indonesia has the same concern with most of the coastal states in the Indian Ocean,” Ridwan Mulyana, the director of [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[JAKARTA — The Indonesian government has welcomed a recent decision by fisheries regulators to curtail the use of controversial fish-aggregating devices, or FADs, which critics blame for a steep decline in Indian Ocean tuna stocks. “Indonesia has the same concern with most of the coastal states in the Indian Ocean,” Ridwan Mulyana, the director of fish resources management at the fisheries ministry told Mongabay in an interview. These concerns center on the use of FADs in general — large plastic buoys or floats that are tethered to the seafloor — and drifting FADs in particular, which aren’t tethered. Fish tend to school around floating objects at sea, so these devices make it easy for fishers to trawl them, including juvenile tuna and non-target species. Drifting FADs also contribute to the problem of marine plastic pollution, and can entangle sea mammals, turtles and other species. At a meeting earlier this month of the Indian Ocean Tuna Commission (IOTC), host Kenya initiated a proposal to decrease the number of drifting FADs operating at the same time and to impose a three-month moratorium on the devices. However, the Kenyan delegation backed down from the proposal unexpectedly at the last minute, leaving the Indonesian delegation to push for a vote on it. The result was a majority vote in favor of adopting the proposed measures. A tethered fish-aggregating device in Indonesian waters. Image courtesy of Yayasan Masyarakat dan Perikanan Indonesia. “It was an up-and-down situation,” Ridwan said of the efforts to get the proposal&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2023/02/indonesia-tuna-fishing-fisheries-indian-ocean-fads-eu-fish-aggregating-device/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2023/02/indonesia-tuna-fishing-fisheries-indian-ocean-fads-eu-fish-aggregating-device/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-265733</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Critics allege EU’s ‘toxic collusion’ with fishing lobbies is damaging Indian Ocean tuna</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2023/02/critics-allege-eus-toxic-collusion-with-fishing-lobbies-is-damaging-indian-ocean-tuna/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2023/02/critics-allege-eus-toxic-collusion-with-fishing-lobbies-is-damaging-indian-ocean-tuna/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>07 Feb 2023 17:48:11 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Malavika Vyawahare]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Rebecca Kessler]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[africa]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Food systems]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2021/04/08092905/5187510861_2b4ca31838_k-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=265295</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Who controls Indian Ocean tuna?]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Indian Ocean and Kenya]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Biodiversity, Fisheries, Fishing, Governance, Marine, Overfishing, Supply Chain, Sustainability, and Tuna]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[All three commercially important tuna species in the Indian Ocean are at risk. On Feb. 5, countries hammered out an agreement in Mombasa, Kenya, on one the prickliest issues for tuna fisheries: the use of fish-aggregating devices, or FADs. Members of the Indian Ocean Tuna Commission (IOTC) agreed to reduce the number of drifting FADs [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[All three commercially important tuna species in the Indian Ocean are at risk. On Feb. 5, countries hammered out an agreement in Mombasa, Kenya, on one the prickliest issues for tuna fisheries: the use of fish-aggregating devices, or FADs. Members of the Indian Ocean Tuna Commission (IOTC) agreed to reduce the number of drifting FADs and to impose three-month closures on the devices. Critics say this progress has happened despite the European Union attempting to water down ambition on critical measures aided by the vastly disproportionate negotiating muscle of its delegation to tuna talks, including numerous industry representatives. The bloc’s distant-water fishing fleet reels in the largest share of tuna in the Indian Ocean, most of it taken by massive industrial vessels that use FADs. “EU public authorities and industrial lobbies have merged into a unique body which, on top of damaging marine wildlife and ecosystems also harms developing economies in the Global South,” Frédéric Le Manach, scientific director of BLOOM Association, a French nonprofit, said in a statement. The EU has sent more lobbyists than officials to high-level tuna talks in recent years as negotiations around saving the Indian Ocean yellowfin tuna — a valuable stock perilously close to crashing — intensified, according to an investigation by BLOOM. The IOTC, an intergovernmental body responsible for managing tuna stocks, declared yellowfin tuna (Thunnus albacares) overfished in 2015, sparking years of hectic negotiations centered on setting catch quotas and regulating destructive fishing gear like FADs. That year, the EU delegation to&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2023/02/critics-allege-eus-toxic-collusion-with-fishing-lobbies-is-damaging-indian-ocean-tuna/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2023/02/critics-allege-eus-toxic-collusion-with-fishing-lobbies-is-damaging-indian-ocean-tuna/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-265295</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>‘It was a shark operation’: Q&#038;A with Indonesian crew abused on Chinese shark-finning boat</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2022/12/it-was-a-shark-operation-qa-with-indonesian-crew-abused-on-chinese-shark-finning-boat/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2022/12/it-was-a-shark-operation-qa-with-indonesian-crew-abused-on-chinese-shark-finning-boat/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>02 Dec 2022 16:59:04 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Basten GokkonPhilip Jacobson]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Rebecca Kessler]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2022/11/01155431/Rusnata-12-768x512.jpeg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=263197</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Finning the High Seas]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Atlantic Ocean, China, Global, Indonesia, Japan, Pacific Ocean, Samoa, South Korea, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Biodiversity, Conservation, Crime, Endangered Species, Environment, Environmental Law, Fish, Fishing, Global Environmental Crisis, Governance, Illegal Fishing, Marine, Marine Animals, Marine Conservation, Oceans, Organized Crime, Overfishing, Poaching, shark finning, Sharks, Tuna, Wildlife, Wildlife consumption, Wildlife Trade, and Wildlife Trafficking]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[In November, Mongabay revealed a massive illegal shark fishing and finning operation across the fleet of Dalian Ocean Fishing (DOF), a distant-water fishing firm that has claimed to be China’s largest supplier of sashimi-grade tuna to Japan. The investigation followed from an earlier story revealing widespread labor abuses across the same fleet. Both articles were [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[In November, Mongabay revealed a massive illegal shark fishing and finning operation across the fleet of Dalian Ocean Fishing (DOF), a distant-water fishing firm that has claimed to be China’s largest supplier of sashimi-grade tuna to Japan. The investigation followed from an earlier story revealing widespread labor abuses across the same fleet. Both articles were based on dozens of interviews with Indonesian men who worked on the company’s longline boats between 2018 and 2020. One of these former deckhands, Rusnata, now 40, was born and raised in Majalengka, a district in Indonesia’s West Java province. The first time he left the area was in 2014, when he went to work on a Taiwanese longliner fishing for tuna in the Atlantic Ocean. After returning two years later, he struggled to find work on land, having only a primary school education, so he took a job on the Long Xing 607, one of around 35 boats then in DOF’s fleet. The following account has been combined from multiple interviews Mongabay conducted with Rusnata in 2021 and 2022, that have been heavily condensed and edited for clarity. Mongabay: How did you end up going back for a second stint on a fishing boat? Rusnata: I was enjoying being back on land, and I was with my wife. But slowly the money started to run out. We needed more, and there was pressure from my wife’s family. So I decided to go back to sea. When I got home the first time, my intention&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2022/12/it-was-a-shark-operation-qa-with-indonesian-crew-abused-on-chinese-shark-finning-boat/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2022/12/it-was-a-shark-operation-qa-with-indonesian-crew-abused-on-chinese-shark-finning-boat/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-263197</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>As shark numbers plummet, nations seek ban on devastatingly effective gear</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2022/11/as-shark-numbers-plummet-nations-seek-ban-on-devastatingly-effective-gear/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2022/11/as-shark-numbers-plummet-nations-seek-ban-on-devastatingly-effective-gear/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>26 Nov 2022 09:48:29 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Philip Jacobson]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Rebecca Kessler]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2022/11/01154352/Tommy-Trenchard-wire-leader-photo-768x512.jpeg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=262960</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[China, Global, Japan, Pacific Ocean, Spain, and Taiwan]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Biodiversity, Endangered Species, Environment, Fish, Fishing, Governance, Illegal Fishing, Oceans, Overfishing, shark finning, Sharks, Tuna, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Famed undersea explorer Jacques Cousteau had a favorite shark: the oceanic whitetip, or Carcharhinus longimanus. He said they were the most dangerous of all sharks, more so than the great white (Carcharodon carcharias). Some researchers believe the species used to be one of the world’s most abundant vertebrates longer than 6 feet (1.8 meters). Today, [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Famed undersea explorer Jacques Cousteau had a favorite shark: the oceanic whitetip, or Carcharhinus longimanus. He said they were the most dangerous of all sharks, more so than the great white (Carcharodon carcharias). Some researchers believe the species used to be one of the world’s most abundant vertebrates longer than 6 feet (1.8 meters). Today, however, the animal is one step away from extinction, pushed to the brink by overfishing. While sharks are often pulled up accidentally by boats hunting other fish, especially tuna, many vessels target them intentionally, hoping to harvest their fins, meat, and, sometimes, their teeth and internal organs. Such vessels often make use of special tools known as wire leaders and shark lines, whose use is minimally regulated by the multilateral bodies that govern international fishing grounds. Now, those devices may finally face a reckoning. In a bid to save the oceanic whitetip, the U.S. and Canada have asked the Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission (WCPFC), which governs tuna fisheries in those waters, to prohibit the use of wire leaders and shark lines. The WCPFC could vote on the proposal at its annual meeting, to be held next week in Da Nang, Vietnam. An oceanic whitetip shark. Image by Michael Aston/Flickr. A wire leader raises the likelihood of keeping what gets hooked on the line; a shark line increases the chance of hooking a shark in the first place. The WCPFC currently allows boats to use one or the other, but not both simultaneously. Advocates for&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2022/11/as-shark-numbers-plummet-nations-seek-ban-on-devastatingly-effective-gear/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-262960</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>How Mitsubishi vacuumed up tuna from a rogue Chinese fishing fleet</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2022/11/how-mitsubishi-vacuumed-up-tuna-from-a-rogue-chinese-fishing-fleet/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2022/11/how-mitsubishi-vacuumed-up-tuna-from-a-rogue-chinese-fishing-fleet/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>10 Nov 2022 03:36:30 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Annelise Giseburt]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Philip Jacobson]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2022/11/10021337/5-768x512.jpeg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=262397</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Finning the High Seas and Illegal Wildlife Trade]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Atlantic Ocean, China, Global, Indonesia, Japan, Pacific Ocean, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Biodiversity, Conservation, Crime, Endangered Species, Environment, Environmental Law, Fish, Fishing, Global Environmental Crisis, Governance, Illegal Fishing, Marine, Marine Animals, Marine Conservation, Oceans, Organized Crime, Overfishing, Poaching, Sharks, Supply Chain, Tuna, Wildlife, Wildlife consumption, Wildlife Trade, and Wildlife Trafficking]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Tuna is ubiquitous in Japan, from high-end sashimi to go-around sushi chains and every neighborhood grocery store. But despite tuna’s central place in Japanese food culture, few know what really happens on the fishing vessels that supply the country’s tuna market. Last week, a Mongabay investigation revealed a massive illegal shark finning operation across the [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Tuna is ubiquitous in Japan, from high-end sashimi to go-around sushi chains and every neighborhood grocery store. But despite tuna’s central place in Japanese food culture, few know what really happens on the fishing vessels that supply the country’s tuna market. Last week, a Mongabay investigation revealed a massive illegal shark finning operation across the fleet of Dalian Ocean Fishing (DOF), which has claimed to be China’s largest supplier of sashimi-grade tuna to Japan, a top consumer. According to dozens of interviews with men who worked for the company between 2018 and 2020, its boats used banned gear to deliberately catch and illegally cut the fins off huge numbers of sharks on the high seas even as it caught tuna destined for Japan. The article followed an earlier exposé of widespread labor abuses across the same fleet. Since DOF’s inception in 2000, the buyer of most of its tuna had been Japan’s Mitsubishi Corporation and its seafood arm, Toyo Reizo Co. Ltd. Mitsubishi said it suspended that relationship in mid-2020, when the deaths of four Indonesian deckhands from one of DOF’s boats made international headlines. However, the Japanese firm’s two decades as DOF’s most important business partner were critical to the rapid expansion of a fishing company that, former workers said, grew into a major human rights abuser and environmental criminal. About half the tuna consumed in Japan is imported, according to the nation’s Fisheries Agency. While some is farmed, wild tuna caught by foreign fleets also helps satisfy demand,&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2022/11/how-mitsubishi-vacuumed-up-tuna-from-a-rogue-chinese-fishing-fleet/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-262397</doi>				</item>
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