The Pew Charitable Trusts is pushing the International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tunas (ICCAT) to adopt a new harvest strategy in a shift to how it would manage North Atlantic swordfish.
ICCAT is holding one of its annual meetings from 11 to 18 November and is considering a long-term harvest strategy which would set new rules for how it tackles setting the North Atlantic swordfish quota. A harvest strategy, also known as a management procedure, helps regional fishery management organizations (RFMOs) like ICCAT set how it will manage catch limits and other rules for years or even decades to come, which can help reduce contentious annual negotiations.
Disagreements between members states in RFMOs can cause management issues for species as different countries push for different levels of quota. The Indian Ocean Tuna Commission (IOTC), for example, has continuously failed to address yellowfin tuna overfishing as member states fail to agree to quotas that are in line with scientific advice.
ICCAT has already completed a management strategy evaluation of North Atlantic swordfish, which simulates different fishing activities and environmental conditions to evaluate whether rules would meet the RFMO’s objectives.
Esther Wozniak, a manager on Pew’s international fisheries team working in the Atlantic and Eastern Pacific fisheries, told SeafoodSource harvest strategies are becoming a modernized way to manage fisheries, especially at RFMOs...
