The 10-day meeting of the International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tunas (ICCAT) seeks a compromise between ensuring the species' future and salvaging a multi-billion-dollar business spread around the Mediterranean rim.

Conservationists argue that reconciliation is impossible, at least in the short term.

"Bluefin tuna fishing does not have a future unless ICCAT shuts down purse-seine fishing and farming" in the Mediterranean, said Maria-Jose Cornax, an expert with advocacy group Oceana.

Thirty- to 40-metre (100 to 150-foot) purse-seine ships can trap thousands of bluefin during spawning season in a single drawstring net which is then hauled to coastal "farms" where the tuna are fattened for market.

Oceana, along with NGOs Greenpeace, WWF and Pew Environment Group, called on Tuesday for a ban on this kind of fishing.

They also want a reduction in 2011 of the allowable annual catch from 13,500 tonnes -- the 2010 limit -- to 6,000 tonnes.

"That is a realistic scenario," ICCAT Chairman Fabio Hazin of Brazil said when asked to comment.

"One of the things that is being discussed [within ICCAT] is the possible suspension of purse-seine fishing and the caging activities," he said at a roundtable discussion.

The 48-member ICCAT has set the rules and quotas for fisheries in the Atlantic, and monitoring for compliance.

Driven by wholesale prices in Japan that can top 100,000 dollars per specimen, industrial-scale fishing in the Mediterranean and eastern Atlantic has depleted stocks by 85 percent in recent decades, scientists say.

The Japanese consume 80 percent of the Atlantic bluefin catch, and will play a critical role in determining the outcome of the meeting.

"We must create a stock recovery program based on scientific advice and firmly implement it," Masanori Miyahara, the head of the Japanese delegation, told NHK television.

"Japan will take leadership in the meeting to ensure the recovery of the stock," he said.

ICCAT member states have disagreed sharply going into the meeting whether next year's quotas should remain at 13,500 tonnes, as in 2010, or halved or even suspended.

France's fisheries minister, Bruno Le Maire, said his country favoured maintaining the 13,500 tonnes level, a position backed by Spain and Italy.

Britain and Germany, along with EU Fisheries Commissioner Maria Damanaki, have come out in favour of a sharp reduction.

The European Union was supposed to forge a common position going into the meeting, but has so far failed to do so.

Some conservation groups argue that only a complete suspension will allow the species to recover.

ICCAT's scientific committee said last month that extending the 2010 catch limit for each of the next three years would give bluefin in the eastern Atlantic and Mediterranean a 63-percent chance of attaining so-called "maximum sustainable yield" by 2022.

"The commissioners should be precautionary and not go for the higher range of possibility," Hazin said, adding this was "only my personal view."

Critics also say ICCAT is undermined by fraudulent catches, a claim bolstered by recent investigative reports and France's admission in 2007 that its catch for that year was more than double the authorized limit.

"There is so much illegal fishing going on that the only responsible thing to do is to suspend the fishery, get it sorted out, and then open it slowly so the species can recover," said Sue Lieberman, policy director for the US-based Pew Environment Group.

Industry representatives, backed by their governments, say the organisation has cracked down on renegade fishing in the last three years by adding independent on-board inspectors and an improved ship-to-market tracking system.

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