Regulation of the Caribbean red snapper fishery on the Amazon continental shelf: 60 years of conflict between conservation and exploitation

The Caribbean red snapper (Lutjanus purpureus) is a fish of the family Lutjanidae that occurs in the Caribbean and western Atlantic between southern Cuba and the northeastern Brazilian state of Pernambuco, in northeastern Brazil. This snapper is one of the target species most exploited by commercial fisheries in this region. It was first fished in 1960s on the oceanic banks off Recife, in Pernambuco, and Fortaleza, in Ceará state. In the subsequent decades, the Brazilian red snapper stocks have undergone constant fishing pressure and a number of distinct depletion events. The fishery currently operates on the Amazon continental shelf, in addition to northeastern Brazil, and supplies primarily the North American market. Despite the continuous and ongoing management of red snapper fisheries in Brazil, there is considerable evidence that the legal regulations that govern the development of this sector are not adhered to, which, in addition to a twelve-fold increase in landings between 1960 and 2013, led the species to be classified as a Vulnerable by ordinance number 445 of 2014 of the Brazilian Ministry for the Environment (MMA). A number of studies have shown that the species is overexploited, with size at first maturity (L₅₀) being reduced from 43.2 cm in 2002 to 32.1 cm in 2022, and self-reported records 50 % below export volumes. We used snapper productivity data from 1990 onward, which refer to phase 4 of the fishery, that now operates on the Amazon and Northeastern continental shelves. We used four public databases of fishery productivity that included red snapper as a category or record descriptor for the present study: ComexStat, CEPNOR, NOAA, and the ‘Painel do Pargo’ (red snapper panel), and government websites were also consulted to locate management ordinances for the species. We found the maintenance of logbooks, the satellite tracking of vessels, and the control of fishing effort are mandatory but not carried out by the Brazilian red snapper fishery, and there is evidence of discrepancy between NOAA and ComexStat data and exportaxion and importation data. Besides, the lack of compliance with the official regulations on the part of the fishing industry, and the reduced levels of government monitoring have resulted in Lutjanus purpureus being included on the Brazilian list of threatened species. Those results demonstrates that to recover the Brazilian Lutjanus purpureus stocks, government institutions will need to develop effective continuous monitoring strategies for the fishery, which will permit the compilation of good quality data and, above all, they must strengthen their capacity for the control and inspection of this sector’s activities, to guarantee compliance with the regulations.