Coastal Fisheries in the Pacific Islands

Oceanography and Marine Biology: an Annual Review 1996, 34, 395 – 531 © A. D. Ansell, R. N. Gibson and Margaret Barnes, Editors UCL Press COASTAL FISHERIES IN THE PACIFIC ISLANDS P. DALZELL,1 T. J. H. ADAMS1 & N. V. C. POLUNIN2 1 Resource Assessment Section, Coastal Fisheries Programme, South Pacific Commission BP D5, Noumea, New Caledonia. 2Centre for Tropical Coastal Management Studies, Department of Marine Sciences and Coastal Management, University of Newcastle upon Tyne, England. Abstract Coastal fisheries in the South Pacific are reviewed, including descriptions of fisheries, catch composition, catch rates and fisheries biology studies conducted on target stocks. The most widely targeted coastal fish stocks are reef fishes and coastal pelagic fishes. Small pelagic species are important for subsistence and small-scale commercial fisheries. Previously, small pelagic resources were important as a source of live bait for pole-and-line tuna fishing, but this method is declining and only one large bait fishery is left in the region in the Solomon Islands. The pole-and-line bait fisheries represent the only large-scale industrial fisheries to have operated in the coral reef lagoons of the Pacific. Estuarine resources are of major importance only in the large islands of Melanesia but are the staple diet of a relatively large proportion of the total South Pacific population. Deep slope fish stocks form the basis of only two commercial fisheries in the region and expansion of deep slope fishing comparable with the 1970s and 1980s is unlikely to occur again. Commercial fisheries development is currently orientated towards small- and medium-scale long-line fisheries for offshore pelagic resources, where high value tunas and billfishes are caught for export markets. The total coastal fisheries production from the region amounts to just over 100000 tyr-l, worth a nominal US$262 000 000. About 80% of this production is from subsistence fishing. Just under half the total annual commercial catch comes from fishing on coral reefs, which includes a small tonnage of deep slope species. Invertebrates are the most valuable inshore fisheries resources and these include sea-cucumbers, trochus and pearl oyster. Lobsters and mangrove crabs form the basis of small-scale commercial fisheries, as also do penaeid shrimps, except in PNG where they are caught in large quantities through trawling. Mariculture of shrimps is becoming increasingly popular in the region and is a major industry in New Caledonia. The greatest influence on coastal fisheries in the Pacific through the next decade is likely to come from southeast and east Asia, where the demand for high value coastal fishes and invertebrates has led to large scale depletions and has motivated entrepreneurs to seek stocks in the neighbouring Pacific islands. Introduction The archipelagos that are commonly referred to as the “South Pacific islands” are found in an area roughly bounded by the tropics and lying between l30°E and 125°W (Fig. 1). There are three racial and cultural subgroupings of the South Pacific, namely Melanesia, Micronesia and Polynesia. The Melanesian islands are all relatively large archipelagos and include Papua New Guinea (PNG), the Solomon Islands, Vanuatu and New Caledonia. Fiji lies halfway between Melanesia in the west and the Polynesian islands of the central Pacific. Polynesia includes American Samoa, the Cook Islands, French Polynesia, Niue, Pitcairn, Tokelau, Tonga, Tuvalu, Wallis and Futuna and Western Samoa. The Micronesian islands lie mainly north of the equator and include the Federated States of Micronesia — Yap (Fig. 2,117)3, Chuuk (Fig. 2, 16), Pohnpei (Fig. 2, 79), Kosrae (Fig. 2, 43) — Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands, Marshall Islands, Nauru, Palau, and Kiribati. 3. Numbers in parentheses refer to specific locations within countries or territories and are indicated on Figure 2. 395 COSTAL FISHERIES IN THE PACIFIC ISLANDS to the east of erritories of the region. Easter Island (not shown) lies 2350 km Pitcairn Island Pitcairn Figure 1: Map of the South Pacific showing countries and t 396 COSTAL FISHERIES IN THE PACIFIC ISLANDS On the periphery of this grouping are the subtropical islands belonging to: Australia — Lord Howe (Fig. 2, 123), Norfolk Island (Fig. 2, 69); New Zealand — Kermadec Islands (Fig. 2, 124); Chile — Easter Island, Sala-y-Gomez; the USA — Hawaii, Johnston Island (Fig. 2, 37), Wake Island; and Japan — Bonin (Fig. 2, 121), Kazan Islands (Fig. 2, 122). The remaining islands comprise 15 independent countries, and seven territories belonging to either France, the USA or the UK. Some basic geographic and economic information on the South Pacific island countries and territories is given in Table 1 (p. 409). Politically, these are all members of the South Pacific Conference that was first convened in 1947 and which also includes the governments of New Zealand, Australia, the United States, Britain and France. Fourteen independent island states, with the addition of New Zealand and Australia, are also members of the South Pacific Forum that was established in 1971. Both the Conference and the Forum have secretariats housed in New Caledonia and Fiji, respectively. Both institutions support fisheries development and management in the South Pacific: the Forum through the Solomon Islands based Forum Fisheries Agency, which is concerned with managing access by distant water fishing nations to the region’s tuna stocks, and the South Pacific Commission’s Fisheries Programme, which performs research and development on tuna and coastal fisheries. The combined area of the Exclusive Economic Zones (EEZs) of the South Pacific Commission island members (from the Northern Mariana Islands to the Pitcairn Islands) is 29523000 km2, but the land area of 550652 km2 is a small portion of this. Most of the land (84%) belongs to PNG, with the other Melanesian islands and Fiji forming a further 14% of the total. For many of the people of the South Pacific islands, particularly in land-deficient Micronesia and Polynesia, fish is a staple source of animal protein. Although some islanders venture further offshore, fisheries in the coastal zone have traditionally been the target of subsistence activity and provide a major portion of the diet. Even with increasing urbanization and the shift in preference to more imported western foods, fresh fish and invertebrates caught in coastal waters continue to be a significant item in the diet of most Pacific islanders. European exploration in the South Pacific during the last century and the Japanese entry during the 1920s and 1930s was followed by interest in the commercial potential of invertebrate resources in the region, such as in molluscs for mother-of-pearl and pearls, and sea-cucumbers for bêche-de-mer production. Limited interest was shown in the finfish stocks of the region, apart from some commercial exploitation of reef and tuna stocks in the Caroline Islands (Fig. 2, 14) during the 1930s. Following the first World War, however, fishing for tunas such as skipjack (Katsuwonus pelamis), yellowfin (Thunnus albacares) and bigeye (Thunnus obesus), continued to expand until at present the annual landings from the waters in the South Pacific Commission statistical area amount to about 991000 t worth in the region of US$1,460 000 000 (Anon. 1995). Following the Law of the Sea Conferences during the 1970s, the South Pacific islands claimed sovereignty over EEZs extending 200 n.mi from the land. The present commercial catches of tunas are made predominantly within the EEZs of the Pacific islands by vessels from nations on the Pacific rim such as Japan, Taiwan, USA, China, Korea and the Philippines (Anon. 1993a). Impressive though the catches of tuna from the South Pacific are, they have limited impact on the lives of the indigenous peoples of the region. Tuna are caught by highly mechanized industrial fleets of purse seiner, long-line and pole-and-line vessels, often on the high seas. Less than 7% of this tuna is caught by Pacific island vessels and only 25% of the total landings is processed within the region, at canneries in the Solomon Islands, Fiji and American Samoa. The remaining 75% of tuna landings is processed elsewhere by countries on the Pacific rim (Anon. 1991a). 397 398 COSTAL FISHERIESPACIFIC ISLANDS INTHE Figrure 2: Locations of places and geographical features in the South Pacific mentioned in the text. The first reference in the text to a place or feature is followed by the corresponding number in parentheses. COSTAL FISHERIES IN THE PACIFIC ISLANDS By contrast, landings from the coastal zone are more modest, but they have a far greater social and economic impact on the residents of the Pacific islands. Moreover, there is a more immediate risk of over-exploiting the resources in the narrow coastal zones of many Pacific island countries as populations increase and technology improves the fishing power of artisanal fishers. Management of coastal fisheries is an increasingly important priority, but for this to have any hope of success, information and feedback about the status and trends in coastal fisheries must first be acquired by fisheries managers and administrators. The objectives of this paper are: 1. to describe the various coastal fisheries of the South Pacific, 2. review the various biological studies and stock assessment methods used to provide management information 3. to estimate the volume and value of these fisheries, 4. to discuss the possible future trends of these fisheries with respect to social, economic and political developments in the region. In general we have restricted our summaries to the South Pacific islands, but refer where necessary to fisheries for the same or similar species on the periphery of the region, particularly northeast Australia and Hawaii. Northeast Australia contains the Torres Straits (Fig. 2, 104) and shares several important fisheries resources with Papua New Guinea. Hawaii, besides having strong social and cultural links with Polynesia, also provides a biological analogue for the subtropical islands in the south of the region about which relatively little is known.

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