The principle of multi-species management has been discussed by many
international organizations including the FAO. In the 1995 Kyoto
Declaration adopted by the International Conference for the Sustainable
Contribution of Fisheries to the Food Security and agreed to by 95
countries, it was noted that the effectiveness of multi-species management
should be studied and harvesting at multi-trophic levels should be
considered (Government of Japan, 1995). This means that marine mammals
should not be exempted from the sustainable use of marine resources. Also,
in 1999, the Indian Ocean Tuna Commission (IOTC), recognizing the
importance of the ecosystem approach to fisheries management, encouraged
its Scientific Committee to carry out research on the predation by marine
mammals and sharks on tunas caught on longlines. This decision was made on
the basis of many reports of damage caused by the marine mammal predation
in tuna longline fisheries especially those in developing countries.
The North Pacific Marine Science Organization (PICES) also set up a
working group on food consumption by marine mammals and seabirds in 1995
which noted that there is inadequate quantitative data on the ecosystem,
especially feeding ecology of top predators (PICES, 1999). The Fourth
Annual Conference of the Convention on the Conservation and Management of
Pollock Resources in the Central Bering Sea (Pusan, Republic of Korea,
November 1999) decided to include a study on the ecosystem approach in its
2000 work plan, focusing on the prey/predator relationship between walleye
pollock and marine mammals.
The FAO Conference of Fisheries Ministers (Rome, March 1999) and the FAO
Committee of Fisheries (FAO 1999) also recognized the importance of the
multi-species management approach for the sustainable utilization of
fisheries resources. The competition between top predators and fisheries
was also discussed at both the 51st and 52nd meetings
of the International Whaling Commission. Further, the Scientific Committee
of the IWC plans to hold a workshop on this matter in 2002.
The Scientific Committee of the North Atlantic Marine Mammal Commission
is also currently pursuing studies on the role of marine mammals in the
ecosystem. The 2000 report of the NAMMCO Scientific Committee specifically
notes that for some areas of the North Atlantic, consumption of fish by
marine mammals at least equals that of fisheries (NAMMCO, 2000).
Most recently, participants (mostly fisheries scientists) at The Third
World Fisheries Congress held in Beijing from October 31 to November 3,
2000 which had as its themes the need to feed the world with fish in the
next millennium and the need to balance fisheries production and
environmental concerns, adopted a resolution strongly endorsing further
research and other initiatives in support of the development of
multi-species management approaches to managing marine resources.
This means that we must study the role of whales in the ecosystem
including their impact on fisheries resulting from the consumption of huge
volumes of fish and other marine resources. It also means that the
sustainable use of resources at all levels of the ecosystem (including
whales) is a more appropriate approach to the management of marine
resources than the total protection of one component of the ecosystem
(whales) irrespective of their conservation status.
Contrary to the simplistic position taken by the U.S. Department of
Commerce, all of these international scientific organizations have
recognized that marine mammals do have the potential to impact on
commercial fisheries and that the consumption of fish by marine mammals
must be included in multi-species approaches to managing marine resources.
The U.S. Department of Commerce pamphlet also ignores the fact that
whales are a valuable food resource and that sustainable harvesting is
possible given the abundance of some stocks and the very conservative and
risk averse management procedure developed by the IWC’s Scientific
Committee.
The U.S. pamphlet says "In actuality, other ocean predators might
increase their levels of predation if fish became more abundant". We
agree. Clearly, if fish were more abundant, humans could increase their
harvest to feed people.
We also agree with the U.S. Department of Commerce that "the most
effective way to improve fishery yields would be through better fisheries
management as outlined by the United Nations Food Agriculture
Organization."
However, the Department of Commerce forgot to mention that in 1998, the
FAO’s High Level Panel of External Experts in Fisheries expressed the
view that FAO and all fishery bodies must increasingly develop an ecosystem
approach to management. This means that predator – prey relationships
among the major components of an ecosystem must be understood.
It also means that we can not ignore the consumption of fish by
cetaceans which is estimated to be 3 to 5 times the amount of marine
resources harvested for human consumption. Indeed, cetacean/fisheries
interactions have become a major issue in many parts of the world and it is
an important issue in the context of world food security. It does not make
sense on one hand, to implement fishing fleet reduction recommended as
necessary by the FAO and on the other hand, to ignore the huge consumption
of fish by cetaceans.
Whales have been increasing since the introduction of the moratorium on
commercial whaling almost 20 years ago. Fish populations have not increased
during this time so that the competition between whales and fisheries has
been intensifying while fish predation on fish has likely decreased or
remained stable.
