European Researchers Advance Toward Farming Endangered Bluefin Tuna

European researchers hope successful efforts to raise in captivity the Atlantic bonito mark a step toward farming the endangered Atlantic bluefin tuna, a relative of the mackerel-like bonito. Scientists at the Spanish Oceanographic Institute, which raised several bonito from eggs to sexually mature adults in a one-year cycle, hope they can apply the techniques to farm the bluefin tuna, a fish whose populations have plummeted 75 percent after decades of overfishing. “We’re developing lots of techniques in the bonito that we can use in bluefin larval breeding and handling,” said the institute’s Fernando de la Gándara, who is part of a European Union program that so far has been able to keep a bluefin larvae alive for two months. The breeding cycle of the bluefin takes four years. Both American- and Mediterranean-spawned populations of the bluefin — whose meat is prized for use in sushi meat — have dropped precipitously in recent decades, and it is hoped that farming could relieve pressure on wild bluefin stocks. Earlier this year, the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) rejected a proposed ban on the international trade of the Atlantic bluefin.