Given that certified tuna results in a significant price increase, it is understandable that ANP countries should have an interest in keeping their communities more valuable. Historically, the Nauru Agreement and other joint fisheries management agreements concluded by the contracting parties to the Nauru Agreement (usually known as NAPs) have focused on the management of purse seine tuna fisheries in the western tropical Pacific. At the annual meeting, the parties re-examined the implementation of fisheries conservation and conservation measures, including the effectiveness of measures to reduce fish mortality, particularly for young fin and yellowfin tuna. In October 2010, the eight parties to the Nauru Agreement (NAP) extended their ban on tuna fishing to approximately 4.5 million square kilometres of high seas in the Pacific Ocean by purse seine vessels licensed to fish in their combined exclusive economic zones. [2] Enlargement was presented at the 6th meeting of the Technical and Compliance Committee of the Western Pacific Fisheries Commission (WCPFC). The 1982 UN Convention on the Law of the Sea and the declaration of the 200-mile Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) provide the legal framework for countries to manage and use resources in their designated areas (UNCLOS 1982). The EEZ declaration prompted Pacific countries to create a forum to promote regional harmonization of fisheries policy to jointly manage tuna resources and provide technical advice and assistance to tuna access agreements (Havice 2010). However, history shows that slow progress has been made in effectively managing economic yields and the sustainability of tuna stocks. The results also underline the importance of third-party transfers on the economic benefits of countries. In summary, our results, without third-party transfers, show that distributions from participation are better if full compliance is respected – which corresponds to the theoretically ideal situation and the future objective.
The role of these transfers in non-compliance with the VDS raises broader questions about the political economy of fisheries agreements and their impact on the success of fisheries regionalism.