None of the catches made by foreign based-vessels are landed in Samoa.  Most of these foreign catches are tuna, which is delivered to the canneries in Pago Pago, American Samoa.

SECTOR OVERVIEW: BROAD OBJECTIVES AND STRATEGIES

According to the most recent annual report of the Fisheries Division, the government  mission in fisheries is “to take actions that promote the optimum and ecological sustainable use of the country’s fishery resources and to develop suitable alternatives to substitute for harvesting depleted resources and maximize benefits to Samoa”.

Further information on the government’s broad objectives in the fisheries sector are given in the Fisheries Act 1988.  The Act empowers the Director responsible for fisheries to “propose management and development measures designed to obtain the maximum benefits from the fishery resources for the people of Samoa, both present and future.” 

Overview of government management strategy 

The strategy adopted by the government for achieving the management objectives is to stabilize the harvests in the offshore commercial fishery and to devolve responsibility for management of inshore fisheries to villages.

Because of the very different economic and social condition in which the various fisheries in Samoa operate, the Fisheries Division has partitioned the fisheries into two main management systems: village-based fisheries and commercial fisheries.  

DESCRIPTION OF MAIN MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS FOR MAJOR FISHERIES 

Village-based fisheries  

The stocks exploited by the village-based fisheries are those edible marine resources found in the inshore, lagoon, and reef areas.  A vast number of species are captured, but the most important resource groups are: finfish (especially surgeonfish, grouper, mullet, carangids, rabbit fish), octopus, giant clams, beche de mer, turbo, and crab.  

None of these resources are subject to bilateral or regional fishery management arrangements.  

The Government of Samoa has adopted a policy of community-based management for the village fisheries¹.  As opposed to past practices in which the management of these fisheries were attempted on a centralized national basis, the government is now removing itself from direct management and playing a supporting role to assist the villages to manage the fisheries located in nearby inshore areas.  The Fisheries Division facilitates the management process by showing the benefits of villages managing their own resources, and subsequently by demonstrating a workable management process and providing technical services to the villages. 

According to the Fisheries Division, the goal of the government intervention in small-scale fisheries is for a village to effectively manage their own fisheries resources. The strategy to achieve this goal is for the Fisheries Division to assist each coastal village to develop its own Village Fisheries Management Plan and subsequently for the Fisheries Division to provide management support.  At the village level the objectives of management are usually related to safeguarding seafood supplies. 

The process is to encourage a village community to analyse its fishing practices and problems, and suggest solutions.  The articulation of the solutions takes the form of a management plan. Community undertakings and actions to solve these problems may include introducing fisheries regulations and pursuing other conservation measures.  These undertakings and actions are listed in each village’s fisheries management plan.  As fishery management is likely, in the short term, to reduce the amount of seafood available to the village, the strategy includes support for the village, such as assistance with developing alternative sources of seafood. 

Because of the large number of coastal villages in Samoa (about 230), there are consequently a large array of management measures used in the individual fishery management plans.  The various management measures and their frequency of use is²:

Management measure	Percentage of villages using measure
Banning the use of chemicals and dynamite to kill fish.	100%
Banning the use of traditional plant-derived fish poisons	100%
Establishing small protected areas in which fishing is banned	86%
Banning other traditional destructive fishing methods (eg smashing coral)	80%
Organising collections of crown-of-thorns starfish	80%
Enforce (national) mesh size limits on nets	75%
Banning the dumping of rubbish in lagoon waters	71%
Banning the commercial collection of sea cucumbers (Holothuroidea)	41%
Banning the capture of fish less than a minimum size	41%
Banning removal of mangroves (in villages with mangroves)	27%
Restricting the use of underwater torches for spearfishing at night	21%
Banning the removal of beach sand	14%
Placing controls or limits on the number of fish fences or traps	<10%
Prohibiting the collection of live corals for the overseas aquarium trade	<10%
Banning the coral-damaging collection of edible anemones (Actinaria)	<10%
Protecting areas in which palolo worms, Eunice sp, are gathered	<10%
Offering prayers for the safe-keeping of the marine environment	<10%

It is premature to judge the performance of these management measures. Although monitoring is carried out by both villagers and by Fisheries Division staff, the fact that the management plans and associated management measures are quite new, mostly started in the last few years, makes it difficult to evaluate their effectiveness conclusively.   Some indication of performance, however, is given in a study of fish production completed in 2001.  That study concluded that villages with management plans have the highest catch rate of 2.8 kg per person per hour, compared with coastal villages with no management plans where the catch rate is 1.8 kg per person per hour. 

Under community-based fisheries management, the management rules are enforced by the traditional authorities in the village communities.  Traditional punishment can range from a simple warning, to fines, and even banishment from the village.

Stakeholder input is obtained primarily from a fisheries committee set up for management purposes. This committee is comprised of village leaders, women, untitled men, and others.  The committee produces a village fishery management plan based on perceived problems and group discussions.

Information for management is obtained in two ways.  Information on the more technical aspects of management is obtained from the extension officers and other staff of the Fisheries Division. Information on the abundance of the various managed species is obtained by community members, many of whom have fished the relatively small village areas for many years and are sensitive to changes in quantities of their important seafood items. 

Some mention should be made of another management strategy carried out by the Samoa Marine Diversity Protection and Management Project funded by the Global Environment Facility. The project attempts to create a participatory management model encompassing all coastal resources (i.e. fisheries, mangroves, sand). The project works at the district level to address issues broader than those which can be effectively addressed by individual villages. The project presently works in the districts of Aleipata and Safata encompassing 20 villages. 

Commercial fisheries  

The species covered by the commercial fisheries management system are: albacore, Thunnus alalunga (71% by weight of the current catch), yellowfin tuna, Thunnus albacares (12%), and bigeye tuna, Thunnus obesus (5%). Other species, including skipjack, wahoo, and dolphinfish, are important by-catch. 

Several regional fisheries management arrangements to which Samoa is a signatory have implications for the management of tuna in Samoa:

• Harmonised Minimum Terms and Conditions for Foreign Fishing Vessel Access;
  
  
• Treaty on Fisheries Between the Governments of Certain Pacific Island States and the Government of the United States of America;
  
  
• Niue Treaty on Cooperation in Fisheries Surveillance and Law Enforcement in the South Pacific Region 

Samoa is a signatory to the Convention on the Conservation and Management of Highly Migratory Fish Stocks in the Western and Central Pacific Ocean, but the convention is not yet in force, nor have the details of management mechanisms been articulated. 

As the details of the management system covering the commercial fisheries are quite new, it may be useful to review the recent chronology of events³:

• The Fisheries Division presented the tuna fishery management plan to the Commercial Fisheries Management Advisory Committee (CF-MAC) for consideration in November 1999. 
  
  
• The Cabinet of the Samoa government approved the management plan in September 2000. 
  
  
• In late January 2001 Cabinet approved a submission presented by the Minister requesting an alteration in the plan
  
  
• Regulations for licensing fishing vessels were drafted by a sub-committee of the CF-MAC. The regulations were approved by the Office of the Attorney General in August 2001.  

Inherent in the cabinet adopted management plan is the main objective of the management of the commercial fisheries in Samoa: maximization of catch-rates, profits and foreign exchange. A secondary aim is wide and local participation in the fishery. Recent action by the government also suggests that another important management objective is to reduce the number of lives lost at sea in the fishery. 

The main strategy adopted by the government to attain the objectives is license limitation.  According to a document endorsed by the Fisheries Division⁴, the licensing scheme restricts the number of vessels over 10 meters in length.  Specifically, the number of vessels is restricted to 25 in the 10 to12.4m class, 15 in the 12.5 to 14.9m class, and 8 in the 15m and over class.  Vessels under 10m (which includes most of the existing alia fleet) are not restricted.  

The secondary objective of local participation is addressed by exempting boats under 10 m from licensing limitations.  The strategy for achieving the safety objective is to require both vessel safety gear and inspections for vessel seaworthiness. 

It is premature to assess the effectiveness of the measures, as they have only been in place since September 2000. It should be noted, however, that Cabinet in January 2000 approved seven additional licences in the 15m and over class, bringing this to 15, suggesting some lack of political will to adhere to the agreed plan.  Also to be considered is that, given that the main objective is “maximization of catch-rates, profits and foreign exchange”, it would seem that the applied measure is actually geared to the stabilzation of catch-rates, profits and foreign exchange. 

A number of institutional arrangements have been made for the management scheme: 

• Establishment of a Commercial Fisheries Extension Service in the Fisheries Division to be responsible for organizing and administering the management interventions of the government.
  
  
• Establishment of the Commercial Fishery Management Advisory Committee as a consultative body. The committee is made up of elected representatives from the tuna fishing industry and appointed representatives from relevant government departments.   

The Fisheries Act 1988 states “any police officer authorised in writing by the Commissioner of Police, or any other person authorised in writing by the Minister” is able to enforce the requirement for a vessel to have a valid license for this limited entry fishery. In practice, the requirement for a license is enforced by officials of the Fisheries Division.  In addition, Fisheries Division officials have in the past discouraged the canneries in American Samoa from buying fish from Samoa-based vessels which are not licensed. 

Information for management of the fishery comes from a variety of sources. The Fisheries Divisions receives logbook data from vessel operators, focusing on the larger vessels of the fleet. The logbook data is analyzed at the Fisheries Division and also forwarded to the Oceanic Fisheries Programme of the Secretariat of the Pacific Community where it is combined with similar information from neighboring countries to provide a regional perspective to Samoa on tuna resources.  The Fisheries Division also has access to fish export records from the Customs Department and fish receipt information from the canneries. Lastly, a large amount of anecdotal information is obtained from vessel operator and fish processors.  

FISHERY LEGISLATION  

The main legislative instrument relating to fisheries in Western Samoa is the Fisheries Act of 1988. This controls the operation of both domestic and foreign fishing vessels. The stated purposes of the Act include the conservation, management and development of marine resources, the promotion of marine scientific research and the protection and preservation of the marine environment.  An important provision of the Act is that the Director responsible for fisheries "may, in consultation with fishermen, industry and village representatives, prepare and promulgate by-laws not inconsistent with this Act for the conservation and management of fisheries".  Using this provision, many villages now have by-laws to assist in managing their fishing grounds.  

Samoa’s Constitution has important implications for fisheries. Under Article 104 of Constitution, all land lying below the line of high water is vested in the State and therefore legally all Samoans have equal access to coastal resources. In practical terms, the village by-laws apply equally to village residents and outsiders and no Samoans can be differentially excluded from fishery areas.

Fisheries Fishing Licence Regulations 2001 were approved in August 2001. These regulations deal with applying for a fishing license, the number of fishing licenses available, special considerations for local/foreign license applications, transferability of licenses, offenses, and penalties. 

Other legislation relevant to fisheries includes the Territorial Sea Act of 1971, the Exclusive Economic Zone Act of 1988, the Fisheries Regulations 1996, and the Fisheries Amendment Act 1999. The latter deals mainly with the licensing requirements for local/foreign vessels, aquaculture operations, and fish processing establishments. 

A review of the fisheries legislation of Samoa was undertaken in late 2001. It is anticipated that this will result in some changes in the law and regulations in 2002.  

INVESTMENTS AND SUBSIDIES IN FISHERIES

There are no published estimates of the value of investments or subsidies in Samoa’s fisheries sector.

Apart from infrastructure, the major government investment in fisheries are the various vessels operated by the Fisheries Division.  The major private sector investments are the longline vessels and fish export facilities.

At present incomes derived from fishing are tax exempt. This could be considered a form of subsidy.

SUPPLY AND DEMAND FOR FISHERY PRODUCTS

Projections for the supply and demand for fish are unavailable for Samoa. Nevertheless, some crude estimates can be made by combining present fish consumption information with forecasts for population increases.  

The population of Samoa in 2000 was 169,900.  Depending on migration and changes in fertility, the 2025 population is likely to be between 197,200 and 305,700. Taking the midpoint, this would be 1.48 times the 2000 population.  

There have been several attempts to estimate per capita fish consumption in Samoa.  During the last decade most of these estimates indicated an annual per capita consumption⁵ of between 46.3 kg to 71.0 kg for the entire country.  

If it is assumed that annual per capita consumption is 59 kg, then Samoa consumed about 10,024 mt of fish in 2000.  If the population expands 1.48 times between 2000 and 2025 as indicated above, and per capita fish consumption remains the same as in 2000, about  14,835 mt of fish will be required in 2025.  

NATIONAL AND SUB-NATIONAL FISHERIES INSTITUTIONS 

Responsibility for fisheries and marine resource matters is vested in the Fisheries Division of the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry, Fisheries and Meteorology (MAFFM), headed by the Assistant Secretary (Fisheries). The Division is headquartered at Apia, employs about 35 staff, and is organised into three main sections as shown in the diagram.

   

Other institutions relevant to fisheries management in Samoa include the Commercial Fishery Management Advisory Committee, fishermen’s associations in Savaii and Upolu, and the Chamber of Commerce to which many of the exporters and operators of the large vessels belong. 

According to a 1998 study of fishers associations, the objectives of both the Savaii and Upolu associations are: