[Coral-List] Regarding the recent posts on the Palau National Marine Sanctuary

[Robert Richmond]

There have been two recent coral-list posts referencing the Palau National Marine Sanctuary (PNMS), including a link to the Guardian article entitled “Palau's marine sanctuary backfires, leading to increased consumption of reef fish.”  We believe some clarifications and context would be helpful. 
 
In 2015, Palau enacted the Palau National Marine Sanctuary (PNMS) Act, establishing a fully-protected sanctuary covering 80% of its Exclusive Economic Zone. The PNMS went into full effect on January 1, 2020. 


The Palau Minister of Natural Resources, Environment and Tourism responded to the concerns raised by the Guardian article in a formal statement issued on April 8:

 MNRET Serial No. 1979/20

April 08, 2020

COVID-19 brings into sharp focus how our problems are interconnected and thus, require multi-sector solutions. Many of us still recall supertyphoons Bopha and Haiyan, as well as the more recent drought. Along with these experiences, we learned that when disasters strike, our whole community is impacted, as enduring threats to various national securities, including water, food, energy, health and economy are multiplied - all at the same time. Challenging times like these make it crucial for our community to be resilient and adaptive, which require us to remain cognizant of these interconnections; remain collective with shared goals; and maintain, if not increase, our collaborative efforts.

The impacts we are seeing with COVID-19 on our health, educational system, as well as our economy underscore our need for a more diversified economy and ensure the foundations for our food security. Passing the Palau National Marine Sanctuary (PNMS) Act in 2015 represented an achievement for securing additional protection of our rich marine biodiversity; for promoting ocean conservation; and for reaffirming our sovereignty over all our waters. In addition to these, and just as important as these, is that PNMS offered new and increased opportunities for us to develop a domestic fishery. Not only will an active domestic fishery offer more economic benefits from the tuna fishery to the local people, it will also contribute towards increasing our local food security.

In order to achieve these ambitious goals of the PNMS, large-scale changes in our pelagic fishery needed to be made. To transition from the current foreign owned and controlled pelagic fishery to locally owned and controlled domestic fishery with more potential benefits to local people would not be easy and would face challenges. One of those challenges was how to transition and still maintain the local supply of pelagic fish, such as tuna, as foreign fishing fleets were the main suppliers of most of the tuna available locally.

While Palau has begun to feel the unfortunate effects of such a shortage, work is ongoing to address it. Supporting local fishermen has been the focus of this work; staff from the Ministry of Natural Resources, Environment, and Tourism (MNRET) have accompanied local fishermen to visit Japan and Indonesia to learn about fishing cooperatives and their operations, and they will travel to Indonesia in the near future to assess the feasibility of purchasing a pole and line fleet to bring to Palau. Building capacity in terms of gear, training, and boats, is also a priority. MNRET has purchased a 20-foot container for local fishermen to use as cold storage, a central marketplace project has been awarded and construction will soon commence, and a pole and line vessel provided by Japan will be available in 2021. The government of Japan will also partner

with MNRET to provide training to fishermen on proper fish handling and techniques. The Ministry is also providing small grants to help the local fishermen through the Project Development Fund from the Pacific Islands Forum Fisheries Agency (FFA).

While we are transitioning to a fully functional domestic fishery, several foreign fishing boats continue to operate in the 20% domestic fishing zone to help with the supply of pelagic fish until local fishermen are able to fully meet the local demand. Regulations have been put into place to make available at up to 10% of their catch for purchase by the Palau government, and communication between the fleets and the Ministry is ongoing in that regard. Okinawan fleets also fish in the Domestic Fishing Zone, and MNRET is in talks with them to help supplement our tuna supply as well.

Work will continue, for both short term solutions and the long term success of the Domestic Fishery and the PNMS. We want to see sustainable fishing operations managed by our local fishermen, with support from the government. We envision that this will provide food security for both local people and visitors, which is becoming more critical in these changing and uncertain times, as well as ensure we leave a sound legacy of rich and abundant ocean resources for future generations of Palauans.

 

Kind Regards,

F. Umiich Sengebau

Minister

 

An international scientific working group (https://oceansolutions.stanford.edu/pnms-report <https://oceansolutions.stanford.edu/pnms-report>), has provided analyses to inform and support implementation of the PNMS.  Two studies performed by researchers at the University of Hawaii at Manoa (https://www.hawaii.edu/news/2020/03/05/palau-fishing-restrictions/ <https://www.hawaii.edu/news/2020/03/05/palau-fishing-restrictions/>) and the Stanford University Center for Ocean Solutions (https://oceansolutions.stanford.edu/stories-events/new-research-palauan-fisheries-value-chains-informs-marine-sanctuary-policy <https://oceansolutions.stanford.edu/stories-events/new-research-palauan-fisheries-value-chains-informs-marine-sanctuary-policy>), provide specific guidance for  development of a domestic pelagic fishery.  

 Palau has made an extraordinary commitment to leadership in ocean conservation.  The magnitude of Palau’s contribution towards the goal of 30% of the world’s oceans in protection should be recognized as the result of this bold initiative:  the largest percentage of any country’s waters into protection, with nearly 38 km2 of ocean per Palauan, as a legacy for the future of all people.

Dr. Yimnang Golbuu, Palau International Coral Reef Center

Dr. Kirsten Oleson, University of Hawaii at Manoa

Dr. Robert Richmond, University of Hawaii at Manoa

Dr. Fiorenza Micheli, Stanford Center for Ocean Solutions

Dr. Jim Leape, Stanford Center for Ocean Solutions

Dr. Rob Dunbar, Stanford University