Declaration Of Panama Signed:
Twelve-nation, five-environmental-group accord could bring sense to "dolphin-safe" labelling.

On October 4, 1995, Congress received two unique messages from Panama City, Panama. The first, The Declaration of Panama, came from 12 nations; the second was submitted by five major environmental organizations. Both documents were formulated during a meeting called by governments involved in the tuna fishery of the eastern Pacific Ocean.

The Declaration of Panama was supported by the Governments of Belize, Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, France, Honduras, Mexico, Panama, Spain, USA, Vanuatu and Venezuela. This promise of future multi-government action was endorsed by the Centre for Marine Conservation, the Environmental Defence Fund, Greenpeace, the National Wildlife Federation and the World Wildlife Fund.

The significance of the declaration is in the promise of 12 governments to formalize by January 31, 1996, a binding legal instrument that would incorporate numerous changes to the resolutions adopted by the Inter-American Tropical Tuna Commission concerning the regulation of the tuna/porpoise fishery since 1992. However, this promise "is contingent upon the enactment of changes in United States law," specifically the Marine Mammal Protection Act, as follows:

First, that the existing primary and secondary embargoes be "effectively lifted for" tuna caught in compliance with the La Jolla Agreement as modified by the Panama Declaration.

Second, that access to the U.S. market be "effectively opened to tuna" from states who are members of the Tuna Commission and from states who have initiated steps to become members.

Third, that a change in the labelling of canned tuna as dolphin-safe be made to mean that such term "may not be used for any tuna caught in the eastern Pacific Ocean by a purse seine vessel in a set in which a dolphin mortality occurred as documented by observers by weight calculation and well location."

top

Written support for these legislative changes by the five environmental organizations was specific and clear. In the concluding paragraph of their statement, the five environmental groups pledged to work with the foreign governments and Congress. However, these groups noted that they were "faced with a significant challenge to obtain enactment of changes to U.S. legislation in the time frame envisioned in the Panama Declaration." This concern may have been prompted by the fact that four members of Congress wrote to President Clinton on October 2, 1995, strongly objecting to any change in the definition of the term "dolphin safe". The two Congressmen and two Senators apparently failed to convince the President to reject participation in the declaration.

The binding instrument promised by the governments is to consist of the La Jolla Agreement, its appendices, the decisions of the governments under that agreement as modified by the commitments contained in the Declaration of Panama. In 1992, the Tuna Commission adopted a resolution during a meeting in La Jolla, California, that instituted a seven-year program of declining annual limits on porpoise mortality commencing in 1993. For 1996, the agreed limit is established at 9,000 mortalities. For 1997, the limit falls to 7,500 and then to 6,500 for 1998. For 1999, the limit cannot exceed 5,000. To implement this program, individual-vessel-dolphin-mortality limits are established on an annual basis. For instance, in 1995 the dolphin-mortality limit for each vessel during the second half of 1995 is 57 animals. In the Declaration of Panama, the governments have committed themselves to a substantial modification of such a program. They agreed to a total annual mortality that cannot exceed 5,000. It is this limit, rather than the schedule set forth in the La Jolla Agreement, that is to be used in determining a new mechanism for issuing mortality limits.

In further modifying the La Jolla Agreement, the governments promised to establish a new per-stock, per-year cap that would be adjusted downward in future years. Until the year 2001, the cap arrangement is between 0.2 percent and 0.1 percent of the minimum estimated abundance of a specific porpoise stock. In 2001, the per-stock, per-year cap is to be reduced to 0.1 percent of the minimum estimated abundance. This stock level is to be calculated by the U.S. National Marine Fisheries Service or an equivalent calculation standard.

Also, the governments have agreed to establish a per-vessel, maximum-annual-porpoise-mortality limit that is consistent with the established per-year mortality caps. However, the declaration further modifies the La Jolla Agreement in this regard: "Up to the year 2001, in the event the annual mortality of 0.2 percent of minimum estimated abundance is exceeded for any stock, all fishing sets on that stock and on any mixed schools containing members of that stock shall cease for that fishing year". Beginning in the year 2001, annual mortality of 0.1 percent of minimum estimated abundance is applied for terminating fishing set activities. For the Eastern spinner or Northeastern spotted porpoise stocks, a take in excess of 0.1 percent to minimum estimated abundance will require the governments to conduct a scientific review, assessment and recommendations. The governments agreed to be committed to conduct in 1998 a scientific review and assessment of progress toward the year 2001 objective and consider appropriate recommendations.

top

Besides these important modifications to the La Jolla Agreement, significant changes in other areas have been promised by the governments. For instance, the governments are committed to a series of options for cooperative measures to ensure compliance. If a coastal state issues licenses to non-party vessels to fish tuna within its 200-mile zone, then such licences are to be subject to the provisions of the Final Instrument. Trade sanctions involving embargoes on fish products and/or monetary penalties along with vessel operating restrictions were listed as options to obtain compliance.

The Declaration of Panama also contains promises to establish a system that provides incentives to vessel captains to continue to reduce porpoise mortality, with the goal of eliminating porpoise mortality.

In recognizing the need for governments to obtain qualified advise for achieving the objectives and commitments of the Declaration of Panama, the governments promised to establish or strengthen National Scientific Advisory Committees. Membership of such committees would include "qualified scientists from the public and private sector and non-government organizations."

Regarding conservation standards, the governments are newly committed to "the conservation of ecosystems and the sustainable use of living marine resources related to the tuna fishery within the eastern Pacific Ocean." They promised that conservation and management measures would be based "on the best scientific evidence, including that based on a precautionary methodology, and be "designed to maintain or restore the biomass levels" of harvested and associated stocks at or above levels capable of producing maximum sustainable yield. This new commitment also includes a promise that such measures and methodology would take into consideration a variety of specific factors. In the process of implementing such standards as well as other commitments in the declaration, the governments promise to promote a policy of "transparency" that includes appropriate public participation.

top

On the issue of changing the term "dolphin-safe" the existing U.S. law states that for tuna harvested in the eastern Pacific Ocean by a purse seine vessel, such tuna is only dolphin-safe if an observer certifies in writing that the fishing net was not intentionally deployed during the entire fishing trip on or encircling porpoise. The law makes encirclement of the mixed school of tuna and porpoise the test and not whether the fishermen were successful in effecting a release of the porpoise from the net without mortality. The proposal of the 12 governments and of the five major organizational groups changes "dolphin-safe" to include tuna harvested when the net is used on or to encircle porpoise if no porpoise mortality is noted by the observer. This change recognizes that currently in the eastern Pacific Ocean tuna fishery most of the fishing nets on a mixed school of tuna and porpoise result in zero mortality. Fishermen have complained that the present U.S. law is unrealistic and unfair in that it ignores the existence of zero-porpoise-mortality fishing sets. The existing dolphin-safe rule condemns an entire load of tuna even though zero mortality occurs during the fishing trip. Just one deployment of the fishing net on a mixed school of tuna and porpoise during the trip, whether mortality occurs or not, is sufficient in its to declare the entire load of tuna captured during the trip not suitable for dolphin-safe labelling. The new proposal on this labelling definition is expected to provide an incentive for the fishermen to seek zero porpoise mortality for every fishing set.

Regarding the population levels of the porpoise stocks, Tuna Commission scientists have recently advised their government members that these populations are stable or increasing. NMFS scientists have estimated that the average population of all porpoises in the eastern Pacific Ocean during 1986-1990 was about 9.6 million, including 6.8 million of the three principal species involved in the tuna fishery. The annual growth rate of this population has been estimated conservatively at 2 percent. Applying this rate only to the two offshore spotted porpoise stocks -- the primary stocks mixed with tuna schools -- annual porpoise births from these two stocks alone would exceed natural deaths by 41,000. For 1993, the Tuna Commission reported the total estimated porpoise mortality for all porpoise stocks by all flag tuna vessels as 3,601. In 1994, the estimate was 4,095. Preliminary data for 1995, indicates that the estimate will be about 4,000.

As of October 2, 1995, the Tuna Commission reported the eastern Pacific Ocean tuna catch at about 329,000 short tons versus 277,000 for the same period in 1994. The U.S. fleet's share of the 1995 tuna catch, 8 percent, represents an historic low. The remainder of the catch is shared by the fleets of Mexico (39.9 percent), Venezuela (13.8 percent), Ecuador (12.9 percent), Vanuatu (11.9 percent), and Colombia (6.8 percent). Currently, only five U.S. tuna seiners of over 400-short ton capacity operate in the eastern Pacific Ocean. None of these vessels are permitted by NMFS to fish mixed schools of tuna and porpoise.

How will Congress respond to the opportunity offered by the 12 governments? How will Congress react to the fact that tuna fishermen have reduced porpoise mortality to levels approaching a zero-mortality rate? Will congress accept the reality that no porpoise conservation problem exists in the eastern Pacific Ocean tuna fishery? Will Congress accept proven scientific advise that implementation of the U.S. dolphin-safe policy throughout the eastern Pacific Ocean would endanger yellow fin tuna conservation and cause substantial by-catch waste of juvenile tunas and other sea life? Will we have the answers from Congress by January 11, 1996?