Common Name
Swordfish
Scientific Name
Xiphias gladius
Hilo Fish Company Inc. & Comercio de Pescados Villa Imp. E Expt. Ltda. have combined their industry knowledge and resources to implement regional strategies to improve the sustainability of their target species here in Brazil. Areas of concentration include, but are not limited to, improving fisheries data quality, reducing impacts of non-target species interactions, and increasing shared information between fisheries stakeholders.
In 2023, a pre-assessment was completed using MSC Fisheries Standard v2.01 to identify all environmental indicators for the South Atlantic swordfish stock. To address the areas of sustainability vulnerability in the Brazilian fishery, Hilo Fish Company Inc. and Comercio de Pescados Villa Imp. E Expt. Ltda. have put together a multidisciplinary team of Brazilian fisheries representatives and regional experts to develop a basic FIP for the swordfish (Xiphias gladius) landed by longline in the UoA. This FIP represents 2 supply chain companies, 1 national fishing collective and 72 Brazil-flagged vessels operating out of the ports of Itajaí in Santa Catarina, Itaipava in Espíito Santo, and Rio Grande in Rio Grande do Sul.
Due to the highly migratory nature of the Southwest Atlantic swordfish, the stock is governed at the highest level by the International Convention for the Conservation of Atlantic Tunas (ICCAT) RFMO, and the stock is governed at the national level by both the Brazilian Ministry of Fisheries & Aquaculture (MPA) and the Brazilian Ministry of Environment and Climate Change (MMA).
Based on the pre-assessment (see the pre-assessment Doc.) for the South Atlantic swordfish stock conducted in 2023, one of the Performance Indicators (PIs) was scored so that the fishery would fail under the MSC v2.01 assessment (SG<60) and four of the PIs required conditions for improvement (SG 60-79). The objective of this FIP is to increase the PIs (of scores <60 or 60-79) to SG>80. Efforts to achieve these scores will be undertaken by actions which improve shared swordfish (Xiphias gladius) stock management in the South Atlantic through better reporting and improved data quality, reduction of shark by-catch mortality, and improvements to ETP species interactions in the MoU.
| 4% | 14% | 82% |
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| 0% | 100% | 0% | 0% |
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| 0% | 0% | 0% | 0% |
To address the fishery’s key environmental challenges as to achieve a level of performance consistent with a passing score per the MSC Fisheries Standard v2.01 for the target species swordfish (Xiphias gladius) in the Brazilian UoA by 2028. This includes, but is not limited to, improvements to shared swordfish (Xiphias gladius) stock management in the South Atlantic through better reporting and improved data quality, reduction of shark by-catch mortality, and improvements to ETP species interactions in the MoU.
