U.S., other nations to create fishing coalition amid Japanese opposition

September 6, 2000
Web posted at: 12:15 PM EDT (1615 GMT)

HONOLULU (AP) -- The United States and several other nations have agreed to create a commission to regulate the catch of tuna in the Pacific Ocean, but Japan is threatening to ignore any new regulations if its concerns aren't addressed.

Nineteen of 24 nations attending a conference on migratory fish on Tuesday formally approved the creation of the commission, which supporters say will help ensure a sustainable harvest of fish. Several of the nations, including the United States, still need government approval.

Japan and South Korea oppose the deal, while China, France and Tonga abstained.

Japan complained that concerns it had raised over some aspects of the agreement, including the boundaries of the affected fishing zone, were ignored by the group.

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"If Australia, New Zealand and their voting bloc continue to trample upon our rights and ignore our views, they will leave us no choice but to continue our fishing in the area outside of the proposed convention," said Masayuki Komatsu of the Japanese delegation.

Two-thirds of the world's tuna is caught in the Pacific region and is valued at $1.5 billion to $2 billion a year, according to the Western Pacific Fishery Management Council.

While Pacific tuna stocks are not currently threatened, supporters said the agreement is necessary to ensure their future.

The agreement allows the commission to set limits on how many fish could be caught, where they could be taken, the times of the year fishing would be permitted and what type of gear could be used. The commission also can hire independent observers.

"It reflects a fair balance of interests, in particular between developing Pacific countries in whose national areas large stocks of tuna fish are found, and distant-water fishing states which fish in the central and western Pacific," said Satya Nandan of Fiji, chairman of the Multilateral High-Level Conference on Highly Migratory Fish Stocks in the Western and Central Pacific.

The head of the Japanese delegation, Seiji Kawamoto, said Japan may seek to create an alternative conservation program.

South Korea also voiced opposition. And China opposed giving membership status to Taiwan.

One international fishing legal expert called the agreement burdensome and impractical.

"In all my years in the field, I have never seen a proposed fisheries conservation convention as complicated and unworkable as this," said William T. Burke, professor emeritus at the University of Washington. "It is filled with untried concepts and principles that are sure to raise costs to exaggerated, even intolerable, levels."

Copyright 2000 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

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Western Pacific Fishery Management Council

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