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Sustainable fishing: Reducing impacts
What's the problem?
Each year, billions of marine animals needlessly die due to accidental capture (bycatch) in fishing nets while fragile marine habitats are being destroyed by destructive fishing practices. These damaging impacts of fishing have a serious impact on the oceans.
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More information
Ending the slaughter
WWF's Global Marine Programme is working with fisheries around the world to reduce ecosystem harm caused by damaging and wasteful fishing practices.
A large focus of work is to reduce bycatch, one of the greatest and most pervasive threats to life in the oceans.In 2004, WWF created a Global Bycatch Initiative as part of our work on sustainable fisheries and species conservation. The initiative works with the fishing industry, academia, other conservation organizations, and governments to stimulate new solutions to reduce bycatch and promote them worldwide.
Our work to reduce the damaging impacts of fishing includes:
Giving marine turtles a chance
Marine turtles are particularly vulnerable to bycatch. They are regularly caught in shrimp trawls and on longline hooks - where, trapped and unable to reach the ocean surface, they usually drown.
Off the hook...WWF is working with the Inter-American Tropical Tuna Commission (IATTC) and other partners to introduce a new type of hook in Pacific Ocean longline fisheries that can reduce marine turtle deaths by as much as 90% without adversely affecting catches of swordfish and tuna. The new "circle" hooks are much less likely to be swallowed by turtles than traditional J-shaped hooks, which cause suffocation or internal bleeding when swallowed. Circle hooks are also easier to unhook from a snagged animal.
Mustad, the world's largest fishing hook manufacturer, and the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) have donated over 250,000 circle hooks to WWF for trials in the Eastern and West Pacific Ocean. WWF is also helping with the testing of different types of fish bait, the use of de-hookers, and training in turtle release techniques in these fisheries.
In Spain, WWF and various partners are investigating other ways to reduce turtle bycatch and mortality on longlines, such as alternative hook shapes and biodegradable hooks and lines.
In addition, WWF awarded first prize to an invention designed to minimize bycatch of marine turtles by Pacific Island tuna longline fishers in the 2005 International Smart Gear Competition. The invention involves a simple mechanism to set baited hooks on the longline at depths below 100m. It is based on the observation that turtles, as well as sharks and other non-target species, are often caught on hooks above 100m while tuna are caught on hooks deeper than 100m.
... and out the escape hatch
We are also promoting the use of turtle excluder devices (TEDS) in shrimp trawls. TEDs are metal grids that allow shrimp to pass into the main part of the net, but allow up to 97% of caught marine turtles to escape with only a minimal reduction in shrimp catch.
For example, we assisted in initial TED trials in Mozambique, and in 2003 helped make their use compulsory in the country’s shrimp trawl fleet. As well as saving the lives of up to 5,000 marine turtles per year, the use of TEDs will allow Mozambican fishers to sell their shrimp to the US market.
Further information:
- News: Circle hooks help save marine turtles in Ecuador
- News: New fishing hook could reduce turtle deaths by 90%
- News: WWF hooks up with Norwegian fishing company to save marine turtles
- News: Competition winners to reduce marine bycatch
- Profile: International Smart Gear Competition
- News: Turtle excluder devices now law in Mozambique
- Profile: Marine turtles