a poacher, two 200 kilo specimens and a stratospheric fine from the Civil Guard
On April 20, the Civil Guard detained a professional fisherman in the port of Águilas (Murcia) with two freshly caught bluefin tuna. Each piece weighed a few pounds and the guy had no specific authorization, he had not communicated either his departure or his entry into the port and, of course, there was no trace of traceability documentation. With Law 3/2001, of March 26, on State Maritime Fisheries in the hand, the fisherman is exposed to a fine of up to 600,000 euros for what would be the most expensive kilo of tuna in the world. The story, however, is more interesting. That great success called ‘bluefin tuna’. Atlantic bluefin tuna is one of the great fishery management successes of the 21st century. It has gone from being on the brink of collapse in 2007 to be declared by the IUCN as a species of “least concern” in 2021. I don’t want to exaggerate, but it is something amazing. And the sanctioning regime has had a lot to do with it. Because we don’t even need to remember it, but tuna fishing (even today) is full of irregularities. Understandably, on the other hand. Because, whether we like it or not, the success of tuna recovery has made poaching easier and more profitable than before. Let us keep in mind that, at the beginning of the year, Japan Tuna was auctioned at 11,500 euros per kilo. Obviously, it is an exceptional case, but it gives an idea of the perverse incentives generated by the black market. The striking thing is that what SEPRONA has “hunted” in Águilas cquadruples the legal annual fee that the ships of the Region of Murcia have assigned. Can we do better? We’re not doing it wrong, really:The figures speak for themselves. But the situation is very complex. It makes no sense that recreational bluefin tuna fishing in Spain has become a race to go fishing first. In the last five years, the longest effective fishing season was seven days in 2021. That is, it took fishermen a week to accidentally kill so many tuna that the fishing ended. In 2022 and 2023 there were five days and In the following years, three. Above all, because we know that with tougher regulations this doesn’t happen. We are working on it. Not everything we need, but it’s something. This January it came into force a regulation that tries to digitize the capture record and close the “statistical black hole”. The experts are worse They are not very optimistic either.. They fear that the pressure will grow year after year and that we will not go fast enough. Come on, either we step on the accelerator or things are going to get more and more complicated. And, in the end, the solution will only come when the current system bursts at the seams. It wouldn’t be something exceptional: we are specialists in it. As I said, the good news and the bad news are the same: that this will happen soon. Image | Peter Lam CH In Xataka | Spain is going to continue fishing for eels until we have no more eels to catch
