(not sportsmen) has had considerable input into the preparatory meetings, 

 and NOAA and NMFS have had top level people on the U.S. Delegation. 



The present U.S. position on fisheries was articulated most forcefully by 

 Ambassador Donald L. McKernan at last spring's preparatory meeting held 

 at the United Nations in New York. 



To quote Mr. McKernan, this position is " . . . based on a species approach, 

 that is, on the principle that the management and harvesting of fisheries 

 should be governed by the biological distribution and migration of fish 

 stocks, rather than by arbitrary jurisdictional boundaries." The position thus 

 depends on the fact that some species are distributed along coastlines, others 

 are principally migratory on the high seas, while still others are spawned in 

 freshwater and migrate to the coastal areas and onto the high seas. These 

 three categories of coastal, high seas, and anadromous stocks form the basis 

 for the species approach to international management. 



Marine species in general and billfishes and tunas in particular do not 

 respect the lines drawn in the ocean by governments about their coastlines to 

 delineate their territorial seas or contiguous fishing zones. This is one of the 

 reasons fisheries is probably the thorniest of all the LOS issues. 



The United States species approach calls for the coastal fishes, such as 

 anchovies, cod, and hake, to be managed by the adjoining country, with that 

 country having a preference in harvesting those stocks. If the adjoining coun- 

 try did not catch all the harvestable surplus of a given stock, other countries 

 could take the remainder. The anadromous species, such as salmon, would be 

 managed throughout their migratory range by the coastal country. 



The high-seas species, such as tunas and billfishes, would be managed 

 through an international arrangement, either of a regional or worldwide 

 nature, perhaps similar to or based upon existing international conventions 

 for conservation and management of high-seas resources. Existing conven- 

 tions of this nature include the very successful Inter-American Tropical Tuna 

 Commission in the eastern Pacific Ocean, and the more recently established 

 ICCAT (which includes billfishes and to which I have already alluded). 



The whole question of how best to manage high-seas stocks thus remains 

 unresolved, and we cannot hope for resolution until we know the outcome of 

 Geneva. We can hope that a rational scheme will be forthcoming and that by 

 the time it is effective we will be well on the road toward obtaining the scien- 

 tific knowledge basic to its implementation. 



I want to turn briefly to a serious problem facing us particularly in the 

 United States. I refer to heavy metals found in small amounts in many fishes, 

 and for one of which, mercury, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration 

 (FDA) has established a guideline of 0.5 parts per million. Certain fish, 

 among them billfish and particularly swordfish, frequently exceed this 

 tolerance. Hawaii offers a good example of the impact of mercury on fishing. 



Until the heavy metal problem arose in 1970, Hawaii had no difficulty in 

 disposing of the billfish sport catch, for the fish were used as food ashore. 

 Mercury at levels above the FDA guidelines changed this, and both sport and 

 commercial fishermen are now faced with determining how to dispose of the 

 catch. 



Because of the intense local and worldwide interest in the subject, the 

 scientific papers bearing on it will be summarized at a special public evening 

 session at which Dr. Albert C. Kolbye, Deputy Director, Bureau of Foods, 

 U.S. Food and Drug Administration, will speak. 



While this is the first time a scientific meeting has been held in concert 

 with the Hawaiian International Billfish Tournament, it is the 14th year for 

 the tournament. Mr. Peter Fithian, its chairman and a participant in the 

 Symposium, is one of the founders of the tournament which has done so 

 much to further sport fishing in Hawaii. 



Tournaments of this sort are becoming even more popular and more 

 numerous. On the Pacific coast, we have the San Diego Marlin Club In- 

 vitational Light Tackle Tournament. A swordfish tournament will be held for 

 the first time this September near Santa Barbara, Calif. Several southern 

 California billfish clubs stage tournaments about the tip of Baja California, 

 which with the west coast of Mexico from Acapulco to Guaymas, has long 

 been an internationally famous billfish area. One of the pioneer tournaments 

 is that conducted by the Tuna Club of Avalon, the world's oldest billfishing 

 club. It was founded in 1898 by Dr. Charles F. Holder, the originator of the 

 Tournament of Roses in Pasadena, Calif. The organization began as a bluefin 

 tuna club and held its first tournament in 1899. It expanded to include 

 striped marlin in 1903, and recorded its first swordfish on rod and reel in 1913. 



All along the Atlantic and Gulf coasts, major billfish tournaments are held 

 annually: from Nantucket and Cuttyhunk, Mass.; Cape May, N.J.; 

 Hatteras, N.C.; Cape Canaveral, Palm Beach, Miami, and Panama City, 

 Fla.; New Orleans, La.; Galveston, Tex.; San Juan, P.R.; and the islands of 

 Cozumel and Mujeres off Yucatan, Mexico. This does not pretend to be a 

 complete list, but it does show the widespread popularity of these tour- 

 naments. 



No such recitation would be complete without mention of the International 

 Game Fish Association (IGFA), founded over 20 yr ago by Mr. Michael 

 Lerner, who is today its chairman. One of the objectives of this organization 

 is to keep world records of saltwater game fish. The IGFA has as members the 

 competitive clubs around the world and is governed by an international com- 

 mittee. Its contributions to marine game fishing are legendary. 



I want to touch on cooperative research efforts. We have for several years 

 been conducting a cooperative tagging project off the west coast of Mexico in 

 an effort to monitor the impact of fishing, including the Japanese longline 

 fishery, on billfish stocks. We have expanded our studies this year to utilize 

 the catches made during tournaments to give us additional information on 

 stock and recruitment in the South Atlantic Ocean and Gulf of Mexico. The 

 cooperative game fish tagging program that Mr. Frank Mather of the Woods 

 Hole Oceanographic Institute has fathered for more than 20 yr, will be sup- 

 ported substantially by NMFS as a part of our expanded game fish program. 

 Information to be gained from these studies is vital to our mission of 

 representing all U.S. fishery interests, sport and commercial, in negotiations 

 with other high-seas fishing nations. 



In closing, I want to propose that this Symposium be dedicated to the 

 memory of two men, one a scientist, one a sportsman, who did much to 

 further our knowledge of the ocean and of fisheries: Dr. O. E. Sette and Col. 

 John K. Howard. 



Mr, Chairman. Mayor Kimura, I believe we are opening a Symposium that 

 will have a lasting value. I appreciate the opportunity to be a participant. 

 Aloha and mahalo. 



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