There is a call for a two year ban on fishing for bluefin tuna before this week's meeting in Nadi of the Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission.
A 128kg blue-fin tuna is displayed at Tokyo's Tsukiji fish market as it was auctioned at a price of 9.6 million yen (104,300 USD) on the first day trading of the year on December 5, 2008 after the New Year's holidays. Photo: STR / JIJI PRESS / AFP
The environment advocacy group, the Pew Charitable Trusts, said independent surveys show fishing has depleted bluefin stocks to just 2.7 percent of the levels that existed before the advent of commercial fishing.
The director of Pew's global tuna conservation campaign, Amanda Nickson, said little has been done by key agencies such as the Tuna Commission and governments and this mean a two year moratorium on commercial fishing was needed.
She said under such a scheme blue fin numbers could bounce back quite quickly and the fishing nations need to take action.
"What we have seen for the last four years since it became clear that this population was so heavily in trouble, we have seen delays and lack of adequate action, so if governments are not going to take clear action then we believe that the only respeonsible course of action is a commercial moratorium of the fishing of this species," said Amanda Nickson.