The European Union is funding a project that takes an exciting step in the direction of sustainable tuna fishing. Tuna stocks are rapidly depleting at present owing to overfishing. In a new scheme, costing around $10 million approximately 80 000 tuna in the Indian Ocean are being tagged. A $10 reward is then given to any fisherman who hands over a tagged fish to local scientists and the fish is returned to the fisherman. This is a kind of pre-emptive strike owing to the fact that currently 20 times more tuna are caught today than they were 50 years ago and if no action is taken it won’t be long until they disappear altogether.

Posted by Blue Ventures

Blue Ventures is an award winning marine conservation charity. We rebuild tropical fisheries with coastal communities. On our Beyond Conservation blog you can hear voices from the front line of marine conservation written by our staff and volunteers.

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