Bluefin in Murky Waters
"Anyone familiar with the field will know that the Atlantic bluefin is in trouble, having undergone a swift population decline - largely because of the recent dramatic expansion of fleets in the Mediterranean, which has led to sustained increases in legal and illegal catches. The big players now are purse seine boats, which use nets to encircle and then scoop up whole groups of bluefin as they spawn. Many of the fish are transferred to ranches and farms, where they're kept in cages until they're plump enough to command maximum profit. One of the biggest problems identified by Iccat is how to keep track of the fish during this chain of events. How many fish are actually caught by purse seiners, and how much does the catch weigh? How much goes to ranchers, and is the process traceable? The 2010 fishing season saw initial operations of the Regional Observer Programme for Bluefin Tuna (ROP-BFT), designed to monitor the biological production line, and operated by consultants MRAG and Cofrepeche."
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