Background

Sea cucumbers, processed into beche-de-mer, are a valuable resource for coastal communities in the Pacific. In the case of New Caledonia, there is a long history of fishing for sea cucumbers, dating back to the 1840s (Conand 1990). The fishery is currently composed of mainly indigenous and artisanal fish-ers. The price offered to fishers for sea cucumbers varies from about USD 0.60 to 2.20 per kilo for whole, fresh animals. The increased fishing pressure for sea cucumbers in the Pacific is fuelled by the increasing wholesale price of first-grade product, such as well-prepared sandfish, Holothuria scabra (Fig. 1). In the year 2000, a total of 62 metric tonnes of dried beche-de-mer was exported from New Caledonia (Observatoire Economique, New Caledonia), where sea cucum-bers are still abundant. However, in other places in the Pacific and South-East Asia there has been se-vere over-fishing of high-value species, such as H. scabra, and it is now apparent that depleted stocks can take decades to recover. It is encouraging to see that many Pacific Island countries are now embracing the idea of marine re-serves or Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) to protect some parent stock as a source of egg production for depleted inshore areas. However, numbers of sea cucumbers may be too low in some areas to consti-SPC Beche-de-mer Information Bulletin #16 – April 20022 new infobeche-de-mer-- r Developing optimal strategies for restocking sandfish