Pacific Island Lobster Fisheries: Bonanza or Bankruptcy?

Tim Adams and Paul Dalzell

Pacific Island spiny lobsters (Panulirus species) have been a magnet for New Zealand and Australian fishermen for years. Fisheries Officers in most Pacific island countries have at least one story to tell about a failed Antipodean lobster-fishing or exporting venture, and will cheerfully point out that the only people who continue to make regular pin-money out of Pacific island spiny lobsters are the local fishermen who occasionally supply nearby tourist hotels (and fishermen in the Gulf of Papua and Torres Strait, but we will come to them later). The stories include:-

• a joint-venture company that brought in a foreign-registered motherboat to travel round the islands buying trochus shell and lobster from villages. Under the terms of the business permit, they were not allowed fish themselves, but only to buy from local villagers. Unfortunately, the company could not pay even the concessionary rate of import duty on the mothership, and was later reported to be fishing on one of the islands, not for lobster, but for beche-de-mer, to try and raise this capital;
  
• at the same time as the above, another operation wanted to bring in another motherboat for an identical operation, but didn't bother to follow up the project proposal when the prospects became clear;
  
• a joint venture that brought in a foreign fishing vessel to fish, primarily for lobster, on an outer island. After experiencing coral reef fishery conditions at first hand, during main-island trials, they didn't even stick around to visit the outer island;
  
• a marketing man, "with excellent contacts in Australia, Asia and the West Coast" who reckoned that export marketing was the main constraint on opening up the "vast potential of the Pacific Islands lobster fishery". A joint-venture was set up and struggled for some months experimental fishing over a wider and wider area without apparently making an export shipment;
  
• the foreign fishermen who would not believe that trapping was not an economically-viable form of fishing for spiny lobster on that island, and said that he had a new kind of trap that was proven to work. He insisted on importing a large number of a well-known variety of commercial trap from Hawaii and nothing more was heard (this story is repeated several times from several countries);
  
• a vessel that was recently arrested in an SPC member country close to a reef which has long been fabled as the Eldorado of South Pacific lobster fisheries. Several press reports on the case failed to mention anything apart from fish amongst the catch aboard;
  
• a foreign vessel which got into a joint-venture to collect trochus and lobster, using several sets of hookah gear. The vessel had to be boarded several times by the fishing authorities after complaints by villages about the boat fishing in their traditional fishing grounds. It ended up fishing, not for lobster and trochus, but for giant clam, taking over 20,000 clams off one reef in one trip. That reef has still not recovered;
  
• the senior Pacific Islands fisheries officer who estimated that at least one third, maybe half, of the overseas visitors to his office were interested in exploiting the "untapped potential" of his country's lobster resource, but none of whom actually made it to the export profits stage.
  

Given this history of failed commercial enterprise, why do Australians and New Zealanders continue to throw themselves, lemming-like, into Pacific Island lobster ventures?

One reason is that it is perhaps difficult for them to believe that Pacific Island ecosystems are so unproductive compared to their own countries. With the exception of Papua New Guinea, Pacific Islands are not set on continental shelves. A simple comparison of exclusive economic zone (EEZ) area (eg. French Polynesia 5,030,000 km², Kiribati 3,550,000 km², New Zealand 4,050,000 km²) might lead one to conclude that the fishery potentials are similar, but does not reveal the fact that only a minuscule proportion of the EEZ of any Pacific Island consists of shallow water and reefs suitable for conventional lobster fisheries. It is also not a common item of knowledge that even this suitable area of shallow water is not nearly as productive as an equivalent area would be if it were close to a large landmass, or if it were set in more plankton-rich temperate waters. Most colder-water fishermen are aware that tropical waters harbour a great variety of coral reef species, but not that these species each constitute comparatively small biomasses. When comparing primary productivity with temperate and shelf-fisheries, coral reefs are more like deserts than forests.

The net result is that many non-Pacific island fishermen look at the small volumes produced by island lobster fisheries and assume that they must be grossly under-exploited. It is easy enough to understand why this misconception occurs. Panulirus cygnus (Western Rock Lobster) is Australia's most valuable single-species fishery (Kailola et.al, 1993). The major southern lobster fisheries (South Africa, Australia, New Zealand) are at least an order of magnitude larger than their Pacific Island equivalents (see Table 1), and it may seem obvious that warmer waters should be more productive than cooler temperate and sub-tropical waters. There are many potential local joint-venture partners who are more than willing to believe this optimistic prognosis, particularly if they are not fishermen. Even if they are fishermen, they may not be averse to financing a new boat, or a pick-up truck, out of the preferential bank-loan that helps set up many joint-ventures.

Often, attempts by Pacific Island fisheries officers to alert impending investors to the poor prospects are either construed as attempts to deliberately conceal the nature of the bonanza; as hidebound official obstructionism; or even as personal prejudice against the local component of the joint-venture.

Apart from general explanations about the low comparative productivity of non-shelf coral reef ecosystems and the comparatively small areas available for lobsters to live in, there are also some more specific reasons why Pacific Island lobster is a difficult fishery:-

• The main spiny lobster species present in the islands do not enter traps or pots readily, particularly the lagoon species. Not many outside fishermen believe this, but it has been extensively tested, using all kinds of traps, in all locations, and with all kinds of baits (even the traditional baits of chiton and urchin). Some lobsters are caught, but at a far lower density than would be needed to support a joint-venture. Methods used successfully in Western Australia (on P.cygnus) and Hawaii (on P.marginatus) have all been tried to no avail, but not much of this work has been documented, perhaps because nobody likes to report a failure. The main fishery method remains hand-collection. Note that the lower-value slipper lobsters - Scyllarides and Parribacus spp, sometimes enter these experimental traps (eg. Prescott 1993), but apparently not in large enough quantities to form the prime target of a fishery - although in Hawaii S.squammosus, originally a bycatch, is now a major component of the commercial lobster catch;
  
• Most Pacific Islands reef and lagoon fisheries are subject to some form of customary fishing rights. Even if national legislation does not make this explicit, it usually severely restricts the scope of non-local harvesters. Because available lobster habitats are small, and abundances often fairly low per unit of reef-area, a commercial operation would have to collect lobsters from a very broad catchment area for a sustainable fishery, and this may require the maintenance of a whole set of agreements with many different villages, plus a separate set of harvesters in each village;
  
• Difficult as it is for any western entrepreneur to understand, most village harvesters do not want to make lots of money. Once they have enough to supply their immediate cash needs - to pay the kid's school fees, to buy a bag of flour and a can of kerosene - they leave off commercial fishing until they need some more money, and they put their time into doing the real work of looking after the garden or fishing for the table. Companies that rely on collecting products from village harvesters inevitably find that catches tend to tail off after the first couple of trips. It is THEN that the financial projections should be made.
  
• Even if a commercial operator has no intention of trying to maintain a long-term sustainable fishery, most Pacific Island lobster stocks are already subject to a certain level of local exploitation:- catch-rates will thus not be very high, and a broad catchment-area must still be maintained for economic viability. Only very remote reefs have the possibility of supporting "virgin" stocks with densities high enough to support the expenses of a trip by a large vessel, and all of these have been prospected at least once already. The average recovery rate of these isolated reefs after being hit is unknown, but would be several years;
  
• Many Pacific Island lobsters are now caught with spears, which severely reduce the commercial value of the product, and virtually rules out exports based on such a local fishery. A considerable and sustained educational effort would be needed to obtain unblemished lobsters, and catch rates would inevitably suffer. (The virtual disappearance of traditional lobster trapping methods in favour of spears may also say something about the relative efficiency of these different methods);
  
• Lobster larvae can float around as pelagic plankton for a year or more, and recruits may thus come from a considerable distance away. Even if one country tries to implement a policy of minimal harvesting in an effort to maintain the fishery, its stock may decline if other island groups have depleted their own lobster resources. Lobster recruitment, at least in Hawaii, also appears to be affected by long-term climatic cycles, and total allowable catches may have to changed from year to year to maintain a sustainable fishery. There has been a management plan in place for the P.marginatus trap-fishery in Hawaii since 1982 (WPRFMC, 1991), but the plan could not account for a recently-elucidated connection between climatic events and recruitment and there has been a decline in stocks that has necessitated drastic restrictions on fishing (see Figure 1).
  

Across most of the Pacific Islands the three most abundant species of spiny lobster are P.ornatus, P.penicillatus, and P.versicolor. P.penicillatus is the most common species in Oceania, except for Papua New Guinea and northern Australia, where P.ornatus forms a major dive fishery and produced 400 tonnes of tails in 1986 (Prescott, 1988). Prawn trawlers also used to catch large amounts of these lobsters until a moratorium was declared following the 1984 season (Coates & Lock, 1985). Note that Papua New Guinea is the only Pacific Island country set on a continental shelf, and the P.ornatus populations can make quite extensive migrations across the Gulf of Papua, similar to the migrations of P.argus in the Caribbean. Because of the clustering of lobsters that occurs during these migrations, catch rates can be quite high. But spiny lobsters in the oceanic Pacific Islands, including P.ornatus, do not make these large-scale migrations.

As with all taxonomic groups, the total number of lobster species is greater in western Pacific countries than in the eastern Pacific. There are six Panulirus species in the Solomon Islands, but only P.penicillatus ranges out to eastern Polynesia. Two other species, P.marginatus and P.pascuensis have very restricted distributions and are only reported from the Hawaiian archipelago and Easter Island respectively. But note that P.marginatus is readily trappable and is the basis of a commercial fishery in Hawaii (P.pascuensis is also reportedly trappable, although we have not yet been able to get any information about the Easter Island fishery), whilst the more widespread species in this genus are somewhat harder to catch.

The main Pacific Island spiny lobster fishery, with the exception of Papua, Hawaii and Easter Island, is a P.penicillatus fishery. P.penicillatus catches are usually mixed with some P.longipes, which has a similar ecological range, along outer reef-faces and barrier reefs, favouring more topologically complex formations on windward reefs. These lobsters are mainly hand-collected when they come to the reef-top at certain combinations of moon and tide. Of minor commercial importance, P.versicolor is more of a lagoon species, found in holes under coral heads, and mainly caught by spearing. P.ornatus is usually coastal, found on shore reefs in lagoons and more sheltered habitats and, of course, continental shelves.

Information on stock densities or abundance for Pacific Island spiny lobsters is hard to find, and most "rule-of-thumb" fisheries estimations derive from the two studies made by Prescott (1980) in the Solomon Islands and three by Ebert and Ford (1986) at Eniwetak. In the Solomon Islands, during the SPC-sponsored study of lobster storage methods, a mark-recapture estimate of 46-57 P.penicillatus per hectare of suitable lobster habitat was made on two particular reefs. Since P.penicillatus is found mainly in a narrow band along the face of reefs, this population estimate could also be expressed as 111-128 lobsters per kilometre of reef-edge. At Eniwetak, abundance was estimated from catch per unit effort trends, from 35-164 (with an average of 126) lobsters per kilometre of reef-edge by Ebert and Ford, who reckoned this could support a sustainable catch of around 20kg of whole lobster per kilometre of reef-face per year. We have a great need for further information on Pacific Island spiny lobster densities, and any pointers to additional information would be most welcome.

There is no doubt that there is money to be made out of Pacific Island spiny lobsters, but it is just not in the same league as the Jasus fisheries further south, or even the Panulirus fisheries of Papua New Guinea and Hawaii. It is certainly not going to support anything like big business. Even if a reliable, easy and economical method of capturing these lobsters is developed, the overall stock sizes are so small that a major business just could not be sustainable. Commercial spiny lobster harvesting in the Pacific Islands either has to be small-scale or has to be part of a multispecies fishing operation - it can only succeed briefly as a prime target in occasional unsustainable "pulse" fishing of remote reefs and banks. With the social set-up of most Pacific Islands, and Government restrictions on the use of non-local divers, there is very little scope for outsiders in the actual fishing operation around inhabited islands. With the low catch levels experienced, it is difficult to sustain an adequate throughput for an export market, particularly with the problems that are normally experienced in getting lobsters in good condition (unspeared, and still kicking) from broad catchment areas.

Small quantities of live lobsters are exported from Papua New Guinea (Andy Richards, FFA, pers.comm.) to Hong Kong, but only as part of a broader operation involving live stonefish (Synanceia spp) and other reef fish. In general, at present, the most viable marketing prospects for Pacific Island lobsters are local. The local tourist industry, if well-developed, can easily absorb the entire spiny lobster production of an island, or seaboard.

Lobster fisheries have declined markedly in New Zealand, and the Hawaiian spiny lobster fishery is the subject of increasing restrictions in an effort to restore productivity (Figure 1). It has been the case in the past that the imposition of closures and restrictions on Australian, US, and New Zealand fisheries have led to increased numbers of fishermen trying to migrate their businesses to the Pacific Islands, and there is no reason why lobster fishermen should be any different. Pacific Island fisheries officers should expect the number of joint-venture proposals involving lobster to continue to increase.

This short article is a plea for Pacific rim lobster fishermen and Pacific Islanders alike to embark on any joint ventures with their eyes open. Estimate what length of reef-face you can obtain spiny lobsters from and, if you can't do (or sponsor) some trial fishing to get an idea of stock abundance, use a rule of thumb of 20kg whole lobster per km reef-face per year as your estimate of sustainable production. If the area is already heavily fished, expect less, or if the stock appears unusually dense (greater than, say, 120 per km of reef-edge) then revise your production estimate upwards slightly.

For example, Tonga has (very) approximately 1090 km of reef-face. Multiplied by 20kg annual lobster production per kilometre, this estimates the total sustainable potential spiny lobster catch for Tonga as 21.8 tonnes, which is not too far away from the rough estimate of 20 tonnes actual catch reported by Leon Zann in 1984. Obviously, this sort of rule of thumb should NOT be used for stock assessment, but it can be useful for the rough estimation of possible commercial potential when assessing an investment proposal, and for weeding out obviously outrageous claims.

This article, although it may sound provocative, is based on hard experience. If there are actually any great success stories out there:- joint-venture oceanic-island businesses which have lobster fishing as their main focus, and which have been making sustained profits out of exporting catches of spiny lobster from the same area for more than three years - then please let us know and we will happily change our views. But all such claims should be backed up with an audited set of account books.

Further reading

Anonymous (1992) FAO Yearbook: Fishery Statistics: Vol 70: 1990. FAO Fisheries Series No.38. FAO Statistics Series No.105. Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations, Rome. 647pp.

Coates, D & J.Lock (1985) Fisheries Research Annual Report for 1984. Technical Report 85/5, Papua New Guinea Department of Primary Industry, Port Moresby.

Ebert, T.A. and R.F.Ford (1986) Population ecology and fishery potential of the spiny lobster Panulirus penicillatus at Enewetak Atoll, Marshall Islands. Bulletin of Marine Science 38 (1): 56-57.

Kailola, P.J., M.J.Williams, P.C.Stewart, R.E.Reichelt, A.McNee and C.Grieve (1993) Australian Fisheries Resources. Commonwealth of Australia Bureau of Resource Sciences and the Fisheries Research & Development Corporation. 422 pp.

Polovina, J.J., G.T.Mitchum, N.E.Graham, M.P.Craig, E.E.DeMartini & E.N.Flint (in prep) Physical and biological consequences of a climate event in the Central North Pacific. Draft mimeo 11/5/93, National Marine Fisheries Service, Honolulu.

Prescott, J (1980) Report on the South Pacific Commission lobster project in Solomon Islands. SPC Report 205/80, NoumJa, New Caledonia.

Prescott, J (1988) Tropical Spiny Lobster: An overview of their biology, the fisheries and the economics with particular reference tot he double-spined rock lobster P.penicillatus. SPC Workshop on Pacific Inshore Fishery Resources Working Paper 18.

Prescott, J (1993) A survey of the lobster resources of the Ha'apai Group, Kingdom of Tonga. FFA Report 90/93. Forum Fisheries Agency, PO BOX 629, Honiara, Solomon Islands. 80 pp

WPFMC (1991) Amendment 7: Fishery Management Plan for the Crustacean Fisheries of the Western Pacific Region (includes Environmental Assessment, Regulatory Impact Review and Proposed Regulations). Western Pacific Fisheries Management Council, Honolulu, Hawaii 110pp.

Zann, L.P. (1984) A preliminary investigation of the biology and fisheries of the spiny lobsters (Palinuridae) in the Kingdom of Tonga. Institute of Marine Resources, University of the South Pacific. 55 pp.

Notes:

• Catch data is after Anonymous (1992), except Fiji which is from Fiji Government sources, and P.ornatus in PNG/N.Australia which is after Kailola et.al (1993).
• P.ornatus figures (PNG/N.Australia) are for tail weight only. Pacific Island Panulirus spp figures (central section of table) are almost certainly for whole weight, but it is not known whether some of the other tonnages reported by FAO refer to tail weight or whole weight.

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