Area 87 (Pacific, Southeast)

The Chilean seabass (Patagonian toothfish) Fishery Improvement Project (FIP) aims to improve the status of the fishery to a standard that will allow it to pass a full assessment of a well-established, science-based certification program, such as the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC). The project is promoted and financed by the Magallanes Seabass Operators Trade Association (AOBAC, Asociación Gremial de Operadores de Bacalao de Profundidad de Magallanes), an organization that represents the interests of industrial fishermen who fish this resource south of parallel 47ºS and includes the companies Globalpesca SpA, Pesca Chile S.A., and Pesca Cisne S.A.

The FIP is led by the Fishing Study Center (CEPES, Centro de Estudios Pesqueros), an organization with extensive experience in stock assessment and sustainable use of the resources of the southern austral zone of Chile, including Chilean seabass. CEPES has historically advised AOBAC and together they have developed a series of research projects, in coordination with the fishing authority, Undersecretary of Fishery (SUBPESCA Subsecretaría de Pesca), providing scientific information valuable for its management (https://www.aobac.cl/cepes).

The Chilean sea bass is a deep sea fish with a wide geographical distribution range in the Southern Hemisphere, mainly associated with the cold Antarctic and Southern Ocean waters, extending to the Eastern Pacific, Western Pacific, and Southwest Atlantic. It is a species of high commercial interest due to its high price in the markets and is known internationally as Chilean seabass, Patagonian toothfish and Black hake. Industrial extraction in the Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) of Chile, south of the 47°S parallel began in 1989 in an exploratory fisheries framework. After only three years,  was development the commercial fishing, which was early ordered by a set of measures aimed mainly at limiting access, avoid the excessive growth of fishing effort and regulating catch rates. Currently, the industrial fleet is composed of five factory longliners (freezers) that fish on the slope, between 1000 and 2500 m in depth. Until 2005, the predominant fishing gear was the longline (Spanish system), which was almost completely replaced in 2008 by the chilean longline (cachalotera), a technological innovation in fishing gear developed to avoid depredation of the catch by mammals (sperm whales and killer whales) during the recovery phase of the fishing set. This new fishing gear has additionally incorporated other improvements in its design that have significantly reduced bird interaction and mortality and have contributed to improved fishing yields. In the last decade, the landings of the industrial fleet have been very stable, around 1200 t, with increasing yields per hook in the recent six-year period. The 2022 landing of the AOBAC fleet, which owns 75% of the auctioned industrial fishing quota, was 1284 t equivalent to 73% of the total landing in the fishery area. Since 2015 the fishery has had a discard monitoring program, which has onboard cameras that continuously film fishing operations on all vessels. Estimated discard values are low, only 2% of the total Chilean seabass catch is discarded due to specimens damaged by the action of mammals or other operational factors inherent to the fishing activity that decrease its commercial value.

Overall fisheries in Chile are regulated under the General Law for Fishery and Aquaculture (LGPA, Ley General de Pesca y Aquicultura), which provides the regulatory framework for sustainable management of hydrobiological resources and their environment in Chile, through the application of the precautionary and ecosystemic approaches. Specifically, it establishes that the management strategy, based on catch quota, must reach and maintain the stock around the spawning biomass that produces the Maximum Sustained Yield (MSY). The main conservation measure is the Total Allowable Catch (TAC), allocated through individual fishing quotas, called Extraordinary Fishing Permits (PEP, Permisos Extraordinarios de Pesca) tendered in public auctions. The TAC is established annually by SUBPESCA, based on a range of Acceptable Biological Catch (ABC) recommended by the Technical Scientific Committee (CCT, Comité Científico Técnico) according to the status of the stock and the control rule established in the management plan prepared by the Management Committee (CM, Comité de Manejo) of the fishery.  At present, the management plan is under development, so the CCT is temporarily applying a constant fishing mortality control rule corresponding to an exploitation rate lower than FMSY. 

The status of the Chilean EEZ stock is defined annually by two indicators of the stock assessment model, the fishing mortality rate (F) and the spawning biomass (SSB), and Biological Reference Points (BRP) based on MSY that define thresholds of spawning biomass that it is not advisable to exceed (SSBlimit), desirable levels to reach (SSBtarget) and an upper limit to fishing mortality (Flimit) equal to that produced in the long term by MSY. The spawning biomass of UoA stock in 2021 is 39% unfished spawning biomass (SSB0), very close to the target biomass (40%SSB0) and far from the depletion threshold corresponding to 20%SSB0. Thus, the UPL stock is practically in a fully fished and underfishing condition with mortality levels well below the limit (F45%SSBPR). The 2021 spawning biomass estimate has a significant level of uncertainty, reflected in the width of the confidence interval; however, the probability of being below the depletion threshold is negligible.

The FIP aims to promote collaboration between the government, users of the fishery, and scientific advisors to achieve the objectives of sustainability of the fishery, minimize its impact on the ecosystem and improve its governance.

Update Feb 2025: The majority of the FIP is now MSC certified and the remainder is being assessed via a gap analysis, which will not be available until completion of the certification.

The fishery being assessed is the Pacific Tuna Longline Fishery targeting albacore (Thunnus alalunga), bigeye (Thunnus obesus) and yellowfin (Thunnus albacares) tuna across all regions of the Pacific Ocean.

The Pacific Tuna Longline Fishery aims to meet the rising global demand for tuna in a sustainable manner by assuring catches do not exceed sustainable levels, promoting the ecosystem based approach to fisheries management and strengthening policy and governance systems in the region.

Pacific Tuna Longline Fishery goals:

• Sustainable Fish Stocks – To ensure tuna and other primary species catches across the Pacific Ocean do not exceed sustainable levels
• Minimising Environmental Impacts – To promote the ecosystem-based approach to fisheries management
• Effective Management – To strengthen governance systems in the WCPFC, IATTC and Pacific Tuna Longline fishery.

This FIP was previously part of the Pacific Ocean Tuna - longline (Thai Union) FIP. Half of the UoAs (Vanuatu flagged vessels) are now within the MSC assessment due to the progress they have made. Due to this, the FIP profile was split to allow for the remaining fleet (Chinese flagged vessels) to continue on with their FIP.

Half of the vessels within the FIP have entered and obtained MSC Certification - Pingtairong Pacific tuna deep set longline fishery. The remaining vessels stay within this FIP and will be added via a scope extension.

AGAC has recently assessed its tropical tuna fishery against the MSC Fisheries Standard - it resulted in the certification of the yellowfin tuna stock, which was one of the three Units of Assessment (for more information on this process, click here).

With its Eastern Pacific Ocean skipjack & bigeye tuna - purse seine FIP, the goal is to contribute to the improvement of skipjack and bigeye tuna stock status in the Eastern Pacific Ocean, more specifically in the IATTC area of purview, as these stocks did not meet the MSC requirements in the aforementioned assessment. For that, the work here will focus only on the PIs that did not meet SG80 (mainly the ones that might not be fully tackled by the MSC Certification's Client Action Plan, more specifically to resolve the non-binding conditions that were set) and on the recommendations made by the CAB.

This FIP was developed exclusively by AGAC.

(NB: AGAC = Asociación de Grandes Atuneros Congeladores = Association of Large Tuna Freezers; please note that the denomination OPAGAC [Organización de Productores de Grandes Atuneros Congeladores] is contained in AGAC and refers to vessels flagged in the EU. While the name "OPAGAC" is more widely known, it is AGAC that integrates all the vessels in the association)

Perupez, Sakana del Peru, and Redes-Sostenibilidad Pesquera have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) to design a FIP with the ultimate goal of achieving MSC certifiable status for the common eel (Ophichthus remiger) fishery between the regions from Tumbes to Piura. This FIP has also received the support of Sustainable Fisheries Partnership.

The fishing companies Perupez y Sakana del Peru have access to the fisheries of the Anguilla through smaller-scale fishing permits. They also process and export products to various markets across the globe including Korea, Japan, the United States, Russia, Spain, and Vietnam. These companies promoted the development and establishment of the eel fishing ordinance regulation in the year 2011 with the purpose of establishing fisheries management measures for rational and sustainable exploitation of the eel (Ophichthus remiger) fishing resource, harmonizing the participation of agents involved in the extraction and processing of eel, and contributing to the development of the industry for direct human consumption.

Fishing area: The fishing areas of the eel fleet are located in Tumbes (from Zorritos to the south of Punta Sal) and Piura (to the north and south of Talara and from Paita to the south of Parachique), with extractive activity centered in the province of Sechura-Piura region.

Fishing fleet: The smaller scale fleet dedicated to the catch eel is composed of 18 fishing boats ranging in length from 5.18 meters to 16.72 meters. These fishery boats generally carry an average of 800 traps per boat and have the capacity to receive between 1 and 3 TM of raw material.

Capture method: The common eel is caught whit traps made of gray PVC pipes, measuring about 70 cm in length and 15 cm in diameter. They are closed at each end with a plastic lid that has an opening of about 5 mm between the inlet guides and additional holes at both ends of the trap, which ensure the flow of water through the traps. The cap of the opening is white and clearly visible in the dark waters to attract attention. The traps are filled with bait consisting of anchovies, mackerel and black skipjack or tambourine. The traps are left on the seabed for about 3 hours, then the collection of the traps is started with a hydraulic system that allows lifting the lines of the spinel with the traps. The captured eel is deposited in an isolated cellar containing seawater that keeps the resource alive for further processing in that condition.