Eastern Atlantic bluefin tuna have returned to UK waters after their population declined in the 1960s. Stock assessments over 2012–2014 showed positive trends in abundance, and in 2021, the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) moved bluefin tuna from ‘endangered’ to ‘least concern’ on its Red List of Threatened Species. Despite this improvement in bluefin tuna abundance, careful management is required.

Since the 2021 Trade and Cooperation Agreement between the UK and EU, the UK now receives an allocation of bluefin tuna quota. The International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tunas (ICCAT) is responsible for the management and conservation of bluefin tuna in the Atlantic Ocean, and the Marine Management Organisation (MMO) is responsible for implementing fisheries management decisions in the UK, including on the sustainable management of fish stocks. For the period 2023 to 2025, ICCAT has allocated an annual Bluefin tuna quota of 63 tonnes to the UK, which is split between the commercial fishery, the recreational fishery, and a bycatch quota for certain gear types.

To inform future policy decisions around assigning quota, the Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs (Defra) sought to understand how the costs and benefits of bluefin tuna fishing are distributed across different fisheries (commercial and recreational) and scales (individual, local, town, etc.). Defra commissioned ABPmer and Risk & Policy Analysts (RPA) to evaluate and compare the socio-economic value of the bluefin tuna fishery in English and Scottish waters, focusing on two trial fisheries:

• The commercial fishery, which accessed the tuna through 10 trial licences
• The recreational fishery, which accessed the tuna through a Catch and Release Tag (CHART) programme⁽¹⁾, involving 24 vessels

ABPmer led on the commercial fisheries engagement, and contributed to the overall evaluation for this study.

Study approach

To support the study, we developed a 7-step analytical approach:

• Step 1: Identifying existing data and additional data needs
• Step 2: Designing a costs-benefits framework, and mapping of available data
• Step 3: Creating evaluation questions and conducting engagement activities (commercial fishers only)
• Step 4: Coding of engagement data and synthesis with MMO and Cefas data
• Step 5: Cost Benefit Analysis of recreational and commercial fisheries
• Step 6: 1, 5 and 10-year scenario analysis
• Step 7: Quantification of impact differences

Commercial bluefin tuna fishery evaluation

The study of the commercial fishery found that:

• Landings between August and December 2023 were sold for a total of £179,787, contributing £111,468 in Gross Added Value (GVA)
• Uptake of the overall quota was 46%; if the full quota were to be achieved, the value of the landings would significantly increase from £179,787 to £393,650
• Fishmongers could have achieved a profit of between £380,000 and £510,000 based on landings during the trial period, and between £840,000 to £1.1 million in the event that the full quota was utilised
• Investment costs for licence holders was approximately £170,000
• There was a decrease in income of almost 50% for those that were denied a licence in 2023 when compared with median income achieved in the period 2017-2022, a drop in fishing income of almost £7,000 per vessel

Recreational bluefin tuna fishery evaluation

The study of the recreational fishery, led by RPA, found that, in 2022:

• Total skipper revenue is estimated as £538,030, contributing £277,623 in GVA
• Spending of anglers contributed approximately £388,490 in GVA
• Estimated average operating profit per skipper was £6,913, but £9,540 in 2021, signifying a decrease from 46% to 32%
• The CHART programme supported approximately 34 full-time equivalent (FTE) workers
• Estimated CHART vessel spending was £461,010
• 90% of angler spend was estimated to have been retained in the South West, amounting to £1.17 million

Summary of findings

The social, economic, and (to a lesser extent) environmental impacts of the recreational and commercial fisheries were assessed and compared, demonstrating how the socio-economic Benefit-Cost Ratio (BCR) might develop over 1, 5 and 10 year scenarios.

The recreational and commercial fisheries were also subject to two sensitivity analyses to help understand the potential maximum and minimum benefits of each.

The 1 and 10 year scenario BCRs are summarised below:

The trial is being evaluated again in 2024 - 2025, to help inform decisions on how bluefin tuna quota is managed in the future. The updated evaluation will also consider the expanded Bluefin tuna recreational fishery for 2024, and the changes in commercial quota allocation since 2023.

Read the full 2023 report at the Defra Science and Research Projects website

^{(1) The Catch and Release Tag (CHART) programme involved catching, tagging and releasing bluefin tuna to monitor their population}