Pacific Bluefin Tuna Agreement Moves Forward With Recreational Fishing Kept Separate

Pacific bluefin tuna are showing what can happen when countries actually manage a highly migratory fish instead of just arguing over who gets the last one.

A joint working group between the Inter-American Tropical Tuna Commission and the Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission has advanced a long-term management procedure for Pacific bluefin. The agreement still has to be formally adopted by both commissions before it takes effect, but the direction is important.

The stock was once estimated at roughly 2 percent of its unfished spawning biomass. Today, spawning biomass is estimated at 23.2 percent, with strong rebuilding since 2011. That is not luck. That is what happens when harvest, international pressure and science-based rebuilding plans are forced into the same room.

For West Coast anglers, one key piece is that recreational fishing in the eastern Pacific would remain separate from the commercial catch limit under the proposed procedure. The eastern Pacific share would also begin creeping up, from 20 percent in 2027-2028 to 21 percent in 2029-2030 and 22 percent in 2031-2032.

It is not everything the U.S. and Mexico pushed for, but it is movement. Sustainable fishing opportunity is not anti-commercial, anti-recreational or anti-conservation. It is the balance that keeps tuna in the ocean, boats on the water and coastal businesses alive.