Ross Sea Toothfish Fishery Certified Sustainable

A controversial fishery in the pristine Ross Sea has been certified as sustainable by the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) based on very little scientific evidence.  

The MSC's "Independent Adjudicator", Michael Lodge, has overturned public objections to the certification based on the assurances of a private consulting company, Moody Marine Ltd, contracted by by a group of fishing companies to prove that their portion of  the exploratory Ross Sea fishery is sustainable and worthy of the MSC eco-label.  Note that other nations involved in this fishery not covered by the certification have previously been identified as being involved in pirate fishing leading to the collapse of other toothfish stocks.  

Scientists claim that too little is known about the population dynamics of Ross Sea toothfish and the potential impact of catches to properly determine what would constitute a sustainable fishery.  Toothfish are highly vulnerable to overfishing as demonstrated by the collapse of a number of stocks.  

With this ruling MSC further lowers the bar (see other controversial certifications) on the evidence required to determine sustainability against it's standard.  It provides support to the perverse notion of "fish now and do the science later" - the antithesis of a sustainable approach.  

Consumers should exercise caution in accepting the MSC eco-label as evidence of a sustainably managed fishery and in particular avoid all toothfish or sea bass products.

Ross sea toothfish objection - a flustered partial response?

The Marine Stewardship Council Independent Adjudicator (IA) responded in part on 2 August to the latest submissions from Moody Marine Ltd and Antarctic and Southern Ocean Coalition (ASOC).  The numerous typos are a clue, but there is other evidence that the IA may be becoming flustered.  Perhaps he senses that Ross Sea toothfish is a public symbol of ignorance regarding sustainable fisheries and inherent flaws in the MSC approach?  As a lawyer he must be aware that precedence is being set with each decision he makes.

Given almost no concessions by Moody to his previous remand, the IA now proceeds, step by step, to further dissect, and in some cases revoke, concerns, especially with regard to Principle 2 (Maintenance of Ecosystem), “that that there was a serious procedural irregularity that made a material difference to the fairness of the assessment”.

In doing so, he laments that MSC Fisheries Certification Methodology “leaves a substantial margin of discretion to the certification body in the way in which it sets scoring guideposts against individual performance indicators.  Almost by definition, the circumstances on which an adjudicator could interfere with the exercise of that discretion must be extremely limited.”

This sentiment was echoed recently by another IA on the objection to the controversial Moody Marine Ltd Fraser River sockeye salmon determination when he remarked “Other IA’s, in recent decisions, recognizing the purpose of the OP [Objection Procedure], have described the standard of review available [by the IA to an objection] as being “narrow” and requiring “deference to the determinations of the certification body”.”

In keeping with the narrow scope and need for deference, the IA finds that, although a number of the scores against the Performance Indicator Scoring Guideposts (PISGs) for Ross Sea toothfish appear “generous”, and although Moody has thus far argued against making any revisions based on objections, “I am not persuaded that the certification body made a mistake as to material fact, failed to consider material information or acted arbitrarily or unreasonably in awarding the scores that were given”.

Although the IA again remands several of the Principle 3 (Effective Management System) PSIGs and associated scores for further consideration by Moody, none of these would appear to be “show-stoppers” as far as certification is concerned.  Once the IA has Moody’s response in hand with respect to Principle 3, he says he will then consider the responses to his earlier remand against Principle 1 indicators (Sustainability of Exploited Stock). These do contain some real “show-stoppers”, particularly with regard to the very speculative knowledge regarding the life-history of Ross Sea toothfish.  Will Moody be let off the hook on these accounts too?  Wait and see.

Objection to MSC certification of Ross Sea toothfish to be upheld?

The certification of the Ross Sea longline fishery for Antarctic toothfish hangs in the balance. Independent Adjudicator Michael Lodge will decide in the next few days whether to uphold the ASOC objection to Moody Marine Ltd’s determination, or issue a further remand to Moody to properly address the issues that have been raised.

So far Moody has refused to blink.

In its 2nd June response to Lodge’s initial remand, Moody fought back admitting no changes to its scoring guideposts or scores – 89% for Sustainability of Exploited Stock, 89% for Maintenance of Ecosystem and 93% for Effective Management System. An A+ for sustainability.

Remember though, this is an “exploratory” fishery on a long-lived, slow-growing, low fecundity top predator in a largely pristine ecosystem. As with most exploratory fisheries, we only have rudimentary knowledge of the biology, life history, stock structure and migration of toothfish in the Ross Sea, and management measures must be considered preliminary at best.

Although the CCAMLR stock assessment is the best available, it admits to considerable uncertainty in many aspects. This was pointed out in a critical review of Moody’s draft report by Dr Michael Pawson, an expert in stock assessment who formerly worked at the famous Lowestoft Fisheries Laboratory, but Moody was characteristically dismissive.

In it’s 21 June comments on Moody’s response ASOC does not hold back: “As explained clearly in his decision, the IA[Independent Adjudicator] has had very serious concerns about the process MML [Moody] undertook with regard to this certification and with the conclusions it reached. Nonetheless, MML’s response is, at very best, superficial. It has largely re-stated its existing rationales and has not provided any new, substantive justification or thinking – let alone changing a single score. The response suggests that MML does not take the adjudication process seriously.”

Will Michael Lodge agree or will he give Moody one more chance?

Ross Sea Antarctic Toothfish fishery MSC certification in question

FIS is reporting today that MSC Independent Adjudicator Michael Lodge has questioned the scores Moody Marine has assigned to six performance indicators for the Ross Sea Antactic toothfish fishery following an objection made by the Antarctic and Southern Ocean Coalition (ASOC).  Lodge however dismissed eight of the ASOC objections and also rejected an objection against the definition of the “Unit of Certification”. 

See previous blog entry on this fishery: http://fishyfellow.blogspot.com/2010/01/case-6-sw-ross-sea-antarctic-toothfish.html

FIS reports that ASOC is calling Lodge’s remand a “victory for science and the Antarctic marine environment.” The Coalition argued that the dearth of data on the stock and lack of scientific rigour in the assessment did not support certification of the fishery as sustainable.  Also supporting the objection were the Centre for Biological Diversity and 39 marine scientists under the collective name of Friends of the Ross Sea Ecosystem (FORSE).

FIS reports ASOC Executive Director James Barnes as stating “This fishery should never have been allowed to undergo full assessment in the first place - there are simply far too many unknowns about this highly vulnerable stock, which is precisely why the fishery is officially classified as 'exploratory' by CCAMLR....The adjudicator has agreed with ASOC that Moody cannot justify its scores for a number of crucial indicators.”

Moody Marine has 10 days to issue a “reasoned response” regarding the remand but can apply to Lodge for an extension.  The objections process will be finalised once Lodge considers the response and makes his decision on whether the fishery should be certified or not.  No fishery has thus far been denied MSC certification based on an objection.

Link to FIS article http://www.fis.com/fis/worldnews/worldnews.asp?monthyear=&day=11&id=36508&l=e&special=&ndb=1%20target=

NZ intercepts pirate tooth-fish long-liner “Carmela” in the Ross Sea

A Togolese-flagged vessel Carmela was apprehended Wednesday catching toothfish in the Ross Sea, an area managed by the Commission for the Conservation of Antarctic Marine Living Resources (CCAMLR).

Illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing puts the sustainability of the profitable toothfish fishery in jeopardy.

The fishing vessel Carmela was utilising deep sea gillnets – which are banned in the CCAMLR Convention Area and can have deleterious effects on non-target marine animals and the ecosystem through ghost fishing by lost or discarded nets.

Carmela is believed to be the former Gold Dragon, a vessel included on CCAMLR's IUU vessel blacklist. New Zealand reported the interception to CCAMLR such that other Commission Members do not allow the vessel to use their ports or allow the import of fish caught by the vessel.

http://en.mercopress.com/2009/12/20/nz-intercepts-pirate-tooth-fish-long-liner-carmela-in-the-ross-sea