A purse seiner catching jack mackerel. (Photo: NOAA)
CHILETuesday, February 10, 2015, 03:10 (GMT + 9)
After five days of intense negotiations among member and cooperating countries during the Third Committee of the South Pacific Regional Fisheries Organisation (SPRFMO), held last week in Auckland (New Zealand), Chile managed to obtain 297,000 tonnes for the catch of jack mackerel both in their territorial and offshore waters during 2015. This allocation means 7,000 more tonnes than in 2014.
In the distribution, Chile was followed by China, which received 29,200 tonnes, and the European Union, which was left with 28,100 tonnes.
With these figures, Chile reaffirmed its dominant share of the jack mackerel resource, projecting the fishing activity for the industrial, artisanal and processing sector with stability for the rest of the year.
The agreement reached by the 11 member countries was by consensus, and facing the aforementioned differences between the various delegations, the one delivered by the president of the international organization, Bill Mansfield from New Zealand, prevailed.
"We returned to Chile satisfied, because we not only consolidated our significant participation at tone level but also regarding the control measures for distant fleet, which as a country, we strongly urged to be adopted, such as the regulation of transhipment activities and inspection on board," the undersecretary of Fisheries and Aquaculture and head of the Chilean delegation, Raul Sunico said.
Another achievement of the Chilean delegation was the adoption of a framework for assessing compliance with the control measures for both, member and cooperating states.
In that regard, Sunico pointed out, "In this organization our country not only aims to achieve a certain number of tonnes of jack mackerel but also to generate stringent measures for the management and conservation of fishery resources in the South Pacific".
The next meeting of the South Pacific Regional Fisheries Organisation will be held in Chile, in January 2016.