marviva med

This week (Nov 17 - 24) the International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tunas (ICCAT) meets in Marrakesh, Morocco to discuss the state of Atlantic tuna. Along with Greenpeace and the Blue Ocean Institute, Oceana has called on the United States to push for a complete moratorium on the catch of bluefin tuna throughout the Atlantic basin.

In the famed Tokyo fish market, a single Bluefin tuna can fetch $100,000.

For a little more than a month, Oceana's vessel the MarViva Med has been roving the Mediterranean documenting and exposing illegal fishing, among other activities, and writing about it on their blog.

It’s been said over and over again: Eastern bluefin tuna cannot handle the pressure they face from overfishing. These sleek and powerful fish are unlucky enough to be among the world’s most coveted seafood species, and for years scientists have called for a moratorium as a last-ditch effort to save these genetically pure, irreplaceable creatures. While strict quotas have been in place for years, poor quota enforcement and illegal fishing have driven the bluefin to the brink of extinction.

On Monday, the European Union ended the fishing season for most of the Mediterranean’s purse seine fleet, the ships that are responsible for 70 percent of the Med’s caught tuna. This move could save up to 100,000 bluefin this year alone.

Oceana has been carefully monitoring the purse seine fleet with our new boat, the MarViva Med. We have recorded rarely-seen images of bluefin fattening pens and documented purse seiners illegally using spotter planes in their pursuit of the fish.

I didn’t anticipate that the E.U. would react so quickly and shut down the season well before its original July 1 end date. But our work is far from over. The next step is to make sure that the closure is enforced, and that non-E.U. fishing outfits don’t start targeting tuna as well. We will be watching.

Just two weeks into its maiden voyage, Oceana's new research vessel MarViva Med has started giving up the goods: rarely-seen images of bluefin fishing in progress.

Time is running out to save these creatures, which are big, sleek fish often considered the tigers of the sea. View an exclusive slideshow of MarViva photos showing bluefin fattening cages in the Mediterranean, and stay updated with blog entries from Oceana photographer Keith Ellenbogen.

MarViva Med joins Oceana's Ranger in documenting destructive and illegal fishing techniques. Its mission this summer focuses on bluefin tuna, one of the world's most overexploited fish species. The European Union has ignored the advice of its own scientists and continued to set quotas for Atlantic bluefin well above what the dwindling population can handle.