Moritaka Hayashi

Dr. Moritaka Hayashi is an international lawyer, scholar and author, who is widely considered a leading expert on the impact of human activity on the world's oceans. Over a period of nearly 40 years, he has published extensively on issues involving the law of the sea, including overfishing, maritime shipping and maritime security. In 2008, he served on an international commission that generated controversy by calling for the immediate suspension of bluefin tuna fishing in the Eastern Atlantic Ocean and Mediterranean Sea. He has also served as an official at the United Nations and as a diplomat for the Permanent Mission of Japan to the United Nations.
Background.
Dr. Hayashi began his international legal career in 1971 as an officer at the United Nations. Starting in 1980, he worked as a diplomat at the Permanent Mission of Japan to the United Nations rising to the position of Minister. In 1989, he returned to the United Nations to serve as Principal Officer, and subsequently as Director of its Division for Ocean Affairs and the Law of the Sea. In 1996, Dr. Hayashi began serving as the Head of the Fisheries Department within the United Nations' Food and Agriculture Organization. In 1999, he joined Waseda University in Tokyo, Japan to teach various courses including international law of the sea and international environmental law. He has served on the International Commission on Shipping and an independent panel appointed by the International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tunas.
 He lectures and actively participates in legal conferences worldwide such as the International Conference on Joint Development and the South China Sea held by the National University of Singapore's Centre for International Law in June 2011 and a Law of the Sea Institute Conference at the University of Wollongong, Australia in November and December 2011.
Role in bluefin tuna debate.
By its own description, the International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tunas (ICCAT), is an "inter-governmental fishery organization responsible for the conservation of tunas and tuna-like species in the Atlantic Ocean and its adjacent seas." In 2008, responding to concerns raised by the international community, ICCAT appointed an independent panel to review its own performance. Dr. Hayashi served as a member of this panel.
The report criticized the performance of ICCAT noting that the performance by ICCAT's members in managing bluefin tuna fisheries in the Eastern Atlantic and Mediterranean is "widely regarded as an international disgrace" and "a travesty in fisheries management." 
 Indicating that the collapse of the bluefin tuna stock in those areas "could be a real possibility in the foreseeable future," the panel recommended that fishing on bluefin tuna be suspended until ICCAT's members agree to abide by certain recommendations and international law.
The report attracted the support of several major advocacy groups. For example, World Wide Fund for Nature (formerly, World Wildlife Fund) embraced the report and called the fishery "grossly out of control." Greenpeace indicated that it "believes that EU and Mediterranean fishing countries should bear the brunt of the criticism for having taken bluefin to the brink of collapse, adding that the countries have placed again and again the short term financial gain ahead of the long-term survival of the species and of the livelihood of fishermen that depend on it." ICCAT indicated that, in response to the report, it reviewed the compliance record of each country with a particular focus on eastern bluefin tuna. As of November 2010, however, ICCAT has not agreed to suspend fishing on bluefin tuna.
Dr. Hayashi has long stressed the need for an increase in international cooperation and political will to control the potential devastation generated by market demand. In an interview in 1997, Dr. Hayashi commented: "Looking at the issue of overfishing, for example, history shows that therein lies the road to overcapitalization in industrial fisheries and excessive pressure in the case of small-scale fisheries and a headlong chase in pursuit of greater harvests. This has led to the collapse of some fisheries and fish stocks."