Maluku pole-and-line yellowfin tuna

Location & History

Pole-and-line fishing has been used in Indonesia since the early 1900's, and was originally introduced by Japanese fishers to produce Katsuobushi or "Ikan Kayu" - dried tuna flakes, also sometimes referred to as "bonito flakes" (They're delicious! Find out more here.) In 2018, IPNLF partnered with a local, sustainable tuna fisheries organization, AP2HI to divide national fisheries into several smaller fisheries based on their geographic area. The smaller tuna fisheries could then work on individual improvements to ensure that sustainability targets were met, without adjacent fisheries compromising these efforts. This fishery operates in Maluku, Seram, Halmahera and Banda Sea, in Eastern Indonesia.

How is the Tuna Caught?

All the tuna from this fishery is caught using traditional pole-and-line methods, using one hook on a line attached to a bamboo pole, catching one fish at a time. The vessels in this fishery still use wooden building materials for boat construction and while all vary in size, each vessel employs a crew of between 20 and 50 local fishers. A typical fishing trip will be anywhere from three days to one week, and lands about 1,000 KG to 7,000 KG of tuna per fishing trip - that’s between 6,000 and 40,000 cans of tuna! Fishers use live fish and squid as bait and throw it into the water to start a tuna feeding frenzy. The crew lower their lines into the water and during the frenzy, tuna will catch onto the hooks. The tuna are then slung onboard, where it detaches from the hook and the line is thrown back into the water to start again. The fishery is very selective, which means it catches only skipjack or yellowfin tuna (95% of the catch). Non-target species (also known as bycatch) are animals that the fishery doesn’t want to catch, such as dolphins, turtles or sharks. The use of a single hook and line per fisher means that there is very little bycatch, and because fishing takes place at the surface of the ocean, there is virtually no negative impact on different marine habitats. The catch is then taken to shore and transported to a local factory that typically processes either canned tuna or Katsuobushi.

Unique Features

The fishery provides jobs for local communities both at sea as fishers, and on land in the processing sector, which enhances economic growth and opportunity across the community.

Fun fact: The local community demand and consumption of tuna is pretty high, which can leave the factories without any tuna stock, even after a fishing trip.