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This paper depicts the transshipment activities of vessels involved in the tuna fishery at Port Louis over the last five years and an analysis of the longline tuna fishery carried out by foreign longliners holding a Mauritian fishing licence.
The transshipment of tuna at Port Louis in the last five years have more than tripled when compared to the period 2002 to 2007 where only 12 433 to 17667 tons were transshipped. This rise is mainly attributed to the continuous development of the port and the different services offered while its location in the Indian Ocean has always been one of the most advantageous feature Port Louis could offer as a port.
The increase in the number of licences (from 13 in 1995 to 169 in 2017) issued to foreign tuna longliners over the years has also played a role in a rise of the quantity of tuna being transshipped at Port Louis. Over the past five years (2013 to 2017), an average of 50 216 tons of tuna and tuna-like species were transshipped at Port Louis yearly. A higher percentage of Albacore was observed among the species being transshipped. It is worth noting however that the gap between the percentage of Albacore and yellowfin being transshipped has reduced when we compared the last five years to the period from 2008 to 2010. This tendency was observed since 2011. From 2008 to 2010, a difference of 40% to 57% was noted between the percentage of Albacore and Yellowfin that were transshipped while in 2011 and 2012, the difference between these two species decreased to 22% and 24% respectively.
In the last five years, a difference of 15% to 34% was noted between the two species. The smallest difference (15%) was observed in 2013. In 2016 and 2017, albacore seemed to take advantage again over the amount of yellowfin which was transshipped with 48% of albacore and only 15% to 17% of yellowfin. Apart from tuna, the catch comprised swordfish, sharks, marlins, sailfish and other miscellaneous fishes such as oilfish, dolphinfish and moonfish.
The foreign tuna longliners which were licensed to fish in the EEZ of Mauritius were mostly Asian except for some flying the Seychelles flag. The amount of tuna caught by the licensed longliners ranged between 4584 to 6350 tons (from 2013 to 2017) totalling an amount of 28 733 tons for these past five years. Albacore, Yellowfin and bigeye constitute 80% the catch with a predominance of Albacore representing 43% in the last five years compared to 37% for the three tropical tunas combined. The fishing areas extended across latitudes 00 – 39 0 S and longitudes 43 0 - 830 E. However, the fishing activities were concentrated in the Mauritian EEZ with 85% of the catches.
