Bluefin tuna overfishing 'still rampant'
By Jason Heller, November 7, 2007 @ 02:00 AM (EST)
Source: Telegraph.co.uk
Fishermen caught nearly twice their legal quota of critically endangered bluefin tuna in European waters this year despite stocks being in a state of collapse, according to investigators.Fishermen, acting on market demand from Japan and top restaurants around the world, caught 56,000 tons of critically endangered bluefin tuna, 26,000 tons more than the quota set by the international body charged with regulating tuna catches in the Mediterranean and North East Atlantic.The legal quota of 29,500 tons was double that recommended unanimously last year by scientists of the International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tunas (ICCAT).Conservationists are calling on members of ICCAT which meets in Antalya, Turkey, this weekend to impose an emergency moratorium on all catches to save tuna stocks from commercial extinction.The estimates of rampant illegal catches, made by investigators from the Spanish consultancy ATRT, show that the EU and ICCAT are presiding over some of the highest rates of illegal fishing in the world.
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