A risk-based approach to evaluating marine mammal bycatch

Bycatch by fishing vessels is a threat to marine mammal populations and is costly to the fishing industry. In 2017 the United States released a new rule requiring nations exporting fish and fish products to the U.S. to adhere... [ view full abstract ]

Bycatch by fishing vessels is a threat to marine mammal populations and is costly to the fishing industry. In 2017 the United States released a new rule requiring nations exporting fish and fish products to the U.S. to adhere to bycatch standards comparable to those of the U.S. This rule offers an opportunity for countries to assess the impacts of bycatch in their fisheries that are exported to the US, and to improve conservation outcomes. It also presents a challenge to develop management solutions that are robust to biological and implementation uncertainty, and are accessible when data on marine mammal abundance and fishery interactions are limited. Thus, countries that export fish to the U.S. would benefit from additional guidance about where data collection and changes in management would be most helpful. A multi-disciplinary working group assembled by the Ocean Modeling Forum (OMF) at the University of Washington plans to develop analytical tools that countries could use to assess the sustainability of their marine mammal bycatch. These tools will vary based on the type of data and the nature (gear type, target species) of their export fisheries, and be designed to address a range of data qualities. If applied, these tools could also be included in a plan that would lead to compliance determination for countries that export seafood and seafood products to the U.S. Here we introduce a possible risk-based framework for this tool and introduce three case study fisheries that will be used to develop and test the framework.