Close

Bycatch Agreements and Regulations

A project log for 2021 HDP Dream Team: EJA

Learn more about Team EJA's intelligent buoy, and how their solution will help the global fight against ghost gear.

leonardo-wardLeonardo Ward 07/22/2020 at 04:430 Comments

When fishing gear is lost, abandoned or discarded in the marine environment it continues to capture marine wildlife; the gear creates a risk of entanglement that leads to injuries and death. 

Ghost gear is a source of marine mammal bycatch because the fishermen do not have access to the marine wildlife that is being caught, they can’t sell it or even release it from the gear. 

NOAA Fisheries, also known as The National Marine Fisheries Service, is an office of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration within the Department of Commerce of the United States. To reduce marine mammal bycatch associated with international commercial fishing NOAA Fisheries issued a rule that establishes a marine mammal bycatch criteria for U.S. imports in 2016. This rule not only marks and important step forward in marine mammal conservation, it also incentives fishers to adopt new techniques and technologies to lower the risk of bycatch. 

Dolphins are a common bycatch in fisheries, especially in tuna fishing operations. To minimize dolphin fatalities the the Agreement on the International Dolphin Conservation Program (AIDCP) entered into force in February 1999. Their objectives are:

Discussions