Workshop on Trochus Resource Assessment, Management and Development
Information Section of the SPC Fisheries Programme (1997). Workshop on Trochus Resource Assessment, Management and Development. Noumea, New Caledonia: South Pacific Commission. ISBN 982-203-561-6.
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Abstract: The topshell, Trochus niloticus, is one of the key commercial export fisheries of the Pacific Islands region. Although trochus is native to the western part of the region, its range has been considerably extended eastwards since 1930 through transplantation and now reaches French Polynesia. Although the cost of these transplants has been small, the resultant economic returns, following the 10–20 year establishment period, have been comparatively large. More importantly, these economic returns have largely benefited outer islanders and rural villagers, to whom non-perishable high unit-value export products form an essential component of their ability to earn an income.
The importance of trochus fisheries to Pacific Islanders is reflected in the number of requests for assistance that have been made to the South Pacific Commission over the years. Indeed, the first regional SPC fisheries training activity involved a workshop on trochus, in 1957, and led directly to the introduction of trochus to the Cook Islands. The importance of this fishery has not decreased. Although the world market price has fluctuated and different stocks have occasionally been overfished, the demand is sufficient and the organism resilient enough to maintain fisheries that are more economically and biologically sustainable than many reef fisheries.
The workshop reported here was held in response to the wide regional interest in this resource, and the need to familiarise the new generation of Pacific Island fisheries officers with the issues, but was particularly prompted by the sharp decline in trochus export market prices that many countries experienced in 1990. This workshop was not only to provide training in trochus resource assessment and management, and to enable fisheries staff from different countries to compare notes, but to ‘troubleshoot’ the apparent economic problems that the fishery was facing and provide a basis for deciding future national policies on this resource.
Extra details:
OCLC: 37839740
