We note with dismay the continued problem of an animal-rights campaign that is causing harm to the environment and to those people whose livelihoods depend upon it. Earth Island Institute (EII), based in coastal California, is continuing to threaten American and European processors and distributors of yellowfin tuna with bad publicity if they should follow sound scientific advice and buy tuna from boats that use the dolphin-surround technique in their fishing. (See "Tangled Nets" in the October 2 issue of the Economist)

This is an old story, covered previously here and elsewhere. Dolphins swim in groups, or pods, far out to sea. They may be seen when they surface together to breathe. Large schools of mature yellowfin tuna often swim below them. The fishermen's technique to capture the tuna without harming the dolphins has evolved in the last decade to a highly sophisticated maneuver, in which the dolphins have also learned what to do to save themselves; a boat circles the pod of dolphins, and lays a weighted purse seine net around them under the animals. The top of the seine has colorful buoys to mark the placement. The bottom of the net is drawn shut, entrapping both the tuna and the top-swimming dolphins. The boat then performs a "backdown" maneuver, in which the top of the net is relaxed in the back, between two distinctive buoys. Novice dolphins are encouraged by divers or a man in a small boat, to swim out the back where the top is slightly submerged. Pods of animals that have been previously encircled know what to do, and they head for the open space between the buoys at the back of the net. It is rare that dolphins are harmed by this evolved technique. Tuna do not escape since they stay deep within the net.

Both Greenpeace and World Wildlife Fund agree that this is an environmentally friendly way to catch tuna. Aside from the fact that the encircled dolphins are almost never harmed, there is another plus: This encirclement technique catches only mature, usually male, tuna. Other kinds of fishing nearer the continental shelves of South America, are less selective, and young, undersized fish, spawning tuna females, sea turtles, and sharks may be entrapped and killed as unwanted by-catch in methods which do not use the dolphin surround technique. Yet these other methods are the only ones that Earth Island Institute will "certify" to be dolphin safe, and they provide a list to tuna processors of boats that are "certified" by them to use other than dolphin encirclement methods. Therefore, yellowfin tuna from Mexican boats, and those from 12 other Latin American countries, are not being purchased by the three major American tuna processors, who are given the EII list, and who do not want to be attacked in the media and on the Internet for failure to comply with the EII demands.

Earth Island Institute is suing the government of the United States for insisting that the dolphin surround method is truly "dolphin safe", and for attempts to ease the 1998 law that includes a definition of "dolphin safe". Therefore, the United States still can not allow corporations to import yellowfin tuna from Mexico, because Mexican boats, like many US boats, have become committed to the dolphin surround method. Although it is said that Mexico can sell much of its product domestically, other Latin American countries with smaller populations can not do so. European tuna distributors are also badgered and threatened by EII, although some of them try to slip uncertified product in from time to time.

This is no longer about saving dolphins from fishermen. That job has been done. The issue now is how governments and corporations shall deal with this fraudulent Earth Island Institute campaign that controls the business of tuna marketing, and overrides scientific assessments of fishing technology with severe economic threats to the fish marketing business. The only effective way to correct this situation is to distribute a credible information campaign coordinated by the affected governments, the Inter American Tropical Tuna Commission, and the companies that want the freedom to advertise and distribute a product produced in an environmentally friendly, "green" manner. Although this may be considered too risky by the tuna business, what do they have to lose? Not much, and they have a great deal to gain by promoting and demonstrating concern for both people and the environment. Perhaps the affected parties will soon take Earth Island Institute by the horns, and solve this social and environmental dilemma.