ISSF 2018-09: Survey of the Treatment of Support/Supply/Tender Vessels in Tuna RFMOs*
|Date added||April 18, 2018|
|Category||Technical and Meeting Reports, Technical Reports|
|Tags||Best Practices, CCSBT, FADs, IATTC, ICCAT, IOTC, Koehler, Moreno, Purse Seine, RFMOs, Supply Vessel, Tuna, WCPFC|
|Author(s)||Holly Koehler, Gala Moreno|
The use of man-made floating objects, also known as drifting fish aggregating devices (dFADs), by purse-seine vessels has increased in all oceans. In addition, purse seine vessels often utilize other vessels — called supply, support or tender vessels— to deploy dFADs and service them, such as to repair damage to the dFAD structure itself, to determine if the dFAD is productive, etc. The use of such vessels and recent technological advances have made purse-seine fishing with dFADs increasingly efficient and contributed to effort creep.
The purpose of this Technical Report is to review how the tuna Regional Fisheries Management Organizations (tRFMOs) in the Atlantic, Indian, Western and Central Pacific and Eastern Pacific and Southern Oceans treat support/supply/tender vessels (hereafter “support vessels”), including if they are defined as “fishing vessels” under the parent conventions, and whether or not their use is monitored or regulated by the tRFMOs. Four of the five tuna RFMOs have also established working groups on dFAD management, which have begun to consider support vessel activities as part of their recommendations.
A set of Best Practices is identified to assist RFMOs and other stakeholders in strengthening the monitoring, data collection and regulation of support vessels in the global purse seine fishery.
See also our RFMO Best Practices Snapshot on supply & tender vessels.