Operation Kurukuru 2009, a coordinated maritime surveillance operation in which countries cooperate to detect activities such as illegal, unregulated and unreported fishing, smuggling and people trafficking, was hosted by FFA over 10 days.

Covering an area of approximately 10 million square kilometres - including the Exclusive Economic Zones (EEZ) of Cook Islands, Kiribati, Niue, Samoa, Solomon Islands, Tokelau, Tonga, Tuvalu and Vanuatu - Operation Kurukuru 2009 involved fisheries surveillance and enforcement staff from all of these countries working together with their counterparts from Australia, New Zealand, France and US over 10 days of surveillance.

Surveillance was conducted by individual countries within their respective EEZ's using 7 Pacific Class Patrol Boats (from Cook Islands, Samoa, Solomon Islands, Tonga, Tuvalu, Kiribati and Vanuatu) and one French Patrol Boat. This was supported by aerial surveillance provided by four Maritime Patrol Aircraft (2 P-3 Orions supplied by Australia & New Zealand, a Guardian supplied by France and a Hercules C-130 from the US Coast Guard).

This year Operation Kurukuru was hosted and coordinated by the Pacific Islands Forum Fisheries Agency (FFA) at its regional headquarters in Honiara, Solomon Islands. All countries had access to an FFA web-based map of surveillance flights, licensed vessels and unlicensed vessels, so individual countries were able to send out patrol boats where aerial surveillance had identified suspicious activities or vessels.

Operation Kurukuru 2009 resulted in eight boardings of vessels and one apprehension of a vessel which has been escorted to port for further

investigation. In Tuvalu, 1 vessel was fined USD $10,000 for misreporting of fishing catch. The four aircraft involved in the operation flew a total of 85 hours and covered approximately 800,000 square nautical miles.

Operation Kurukuru is an activity to meet the broader objectives of sustainable fisheries development and management in the Pacific region. This annual operation held in the Eastern and Western FFA Member countries complements other operations held in the rest of the FFA member countries. FFA, 21/08/09.