Photo/Illutration "Sanma" Pacific sauries are processed in Nemuro, Hokkaido, on Nov. 2, 2019. (Asahi Shimbun file photo)

After years of dismal catches of Pacific saury, Japan’s Fisheries Agency has set this year’s catch quota at 155,000 tons, 40 percent less than the record-low 264,000 tons for the previous year.

The cut in the quota is aimed to rebuild stocks of the fish, which have diminished to historically low levels due to decades of overfishing.

Many experts, however, warn that the quota is still too large to ensure population recovery. Japan’s annual haul of the popular fish, known as “sanma,” declined to less than 30,000 tons in 2020, sharply down from at least 200,000 tons annually during the decade through 2010.

This year’s fishing quota is more than five times larger than last year’s actual catch.

Dwindling hauls have driven up prices of the skinny silver fish. In October last year, a Pacific saury of average size (150 grams) fetched an average 260 yen ($2.37) at retail stores in Tokyo’s 23 wards, up as much as 146 yen from a decade earlier.

Once stocks are depleted, it will take a lot of time to restore them, causing prices to remain stuck at high levels. Unless more realistic and effective catch limits are imposed, sanma will be priced out of reach for the general public.

The agency’s decision to limit the catch quota reduction to 40 percent is based on an agreement reached in February among eight member countries of the North Pacific Fisheries Commission (NPFC), including Japan China and Russia, on a 40-percent cut in the overall limit on their catches in the open sea.

The NPFC is an intergovernmental organization established under a treaty on the conservation and management of fisheries resources in the northern Pacific.

The agency feared that if Japan adopts a sharper quota cut than the agreement requires, it could find itself in a disadvantageous position in future negotiations. The agency decided to make the most of the deal.

Its strategy seems to be reasonable, but the fact is that Japan will be the biggest loser if overfishing continues.

Every year, sanma travel to northern parts of the Pacific, in the open sea and Japanese waters, from summer to autumn. Since Japanese consumers tend to be put off by frozen sanma, Japanese fishermen usually catch the fish in Japanese waters to supply fresh sanma to the market.

This allows Chinese and Taiwanese fishing boats operating in the open sea to catch the fish before they reach areas close to Japan.

The insufficient catch quota reduction represents a compromise between Japan, which is eager to lower the limits, and China and Taiwan, which are reluctant to accept sharp cuts.

One more effective and flexible way to set catch quotas in response to constantly changing fish population conditions would be to establish a calculation formula based on stocks to be estimated according to predetermined rules.

The February agreement among NPFC members calls for talks over rules for this approach with an eye to introducing a new system in two years.

Japan, which has accumulated data about sanma stocks, should lead the talks.

Demand for fisheries products in general is bound to steadily decline in Japan in the coming years due to its demographic decline.

Tokyo cannot hope to strike a meaningful agreement on the issue with China and Taiwan by just demanding larger catch quotas based on its past fishing records.

To ensure that future generations can enjoy rich fisheries resources, Japan needs to be more willing to make reasonable concessions.

--The Asahi Shimbun, May 5

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