Sustainable fishing: Improving policy

Long-term success in reducing ecosystem damage caused by fishing must be underpinned by appropriate policy and legislation at national and international levels.

WWF is therefore working with governments, fisheries, and international fora to strengthen and enact legislation, treaties, and agreements to restore marine life and minimize bycatch and damage to marine habitats.

Our underlying principle is ecosystem-based management (EBM), which aims to achieve the sustainable exploitation of natural resources by balancing the social and economic needs of human communities with the maintenance of healthy ecosystems.

Examples of this work include:

• Advocacy: For example, we worked successfully for the International Whaling Commission (IWC) to start tackling cetacean bycatch.

• Research: We perform cutting-edge research on fisheries and bycatch to help governments and the fishing industry keep abreast of new trends and to react accordingly. For example, a 2005 report identifies 9 dolphin and porpoise populations around the world that need immediate protection from entanglement in fishing gear.
  
  Another report documented Atlantic cod bycatch in fisheries under the control of the Northwest Atlantic Fisheries Organization (NAFO). NAFO subsequently committed to key measures identified by WWF to address the problem.

• Bringing experts together: In 2002 WWF sponsored an International Workshop on Reducing Cetacean Bycatch, which brought together cetacean and fisheries experts from six continents leading to the creation of a bycatch taskforce. WWF also helped organize a 2005 workshop that brought together the world’s leading experts on longline bycatch mitigation for different species (turtles, seabirds, cetaceans, sharks) in order to improve communication and collaboration, and create a global approach to reduce longline bycatch.