Tropical Tuna Fisheries

From data to management measures, a challenge for sustainable exploitation



Océane Bouhineau (oceane.bouhineau@ird.fr)
Mathieu Depetris (mathieu.depetris@ird.fr)
Théotime Fily (theotime.fily@ird.fr)
Clara Lerebourg (clara.lerebourg@ird.fr)
Esther Mollier (esther.mollier@ird.fr)



© FADIO / IRD - Ifremer

Introduction

What is the Exploited Tropical Pelagic Ecosystems Observatory? (Ob7)

What is it?

What is it?

The Observatory:

  • is a set of resources (human and material) under the umbrella of the French National Research Institute for Sustainable Development (IRD),

  • under the responsability of Julien Lebranchu (julien.lebranchu@ird.fr).

What is it?

of exploited ressources

What is it?

focused on a tropical

What is it?

and pelagic area

Why do we need this kind of structure?

  • Each country exploiting fisheries resources must declare its activities (transversal variables like capacity, effort and capture)

  • To whom and why?

    • European Commission, if EU member, used for example regarding fisheries agreements
    • RFMOs (Regional Fisheries Management Organisations) to manage population dynamics

What are we focusing on?

Target species and bycatch

  • Major tunas
    • Yellowfin tuna (YFT, Thunnus albacares)

    • Bigeye tuna (BET, Thunnus obesus)

    • Skipjack tuna (SKJ, Katsuwonus pelamis)

    • Albacore tuna (ALB, Thunnus alalunga)

What are we focusing on?

Target species and bycatch

  • Neritic tunas
    • Bullet tuna (BLT, Auxis rochei)

    • Frigate tuna (FRI, Auxis thazard)

    • Kawakawa (KAW, Euthynnus affinis)

    • Atlantic bonito (BON, Sarda sarda)

What are we focusing on?

Target species and bycatch

  • Billfish and pelagic sharks species
    • Swordfish (SWO, Xiphias gladius)

    • Sailfish (SAI, Istiophorus albicans)

    • Blue marlin (BUM, Makaira nigricans)

    • Blue shark (BSH, Prionace glauca)

    • Oceanic whitetip shark (OCS, Carcharhinus longimanus)

What are we focusing on?

Fishing gears

  • Bait boats

What are we focusing on?

Fishing gears

  • Longlines

What are we focusing on?

Fishing gears

  • Purse seiners

What are we focusing on?

Purse seiner school type

  • Free school

What are we focusing on?

Purse seiner school type

  • FOBs: Floating OBjects
    natural


artificial

The information system

Around 4 axes

The information system

Collection: recovery of declarative data (logbook for example), sampling, fleet characteristics, etc.

The information system

Storage: management, administration of databases to store all these kinds of data and ensure long-term preservation.

The information system

Treatment: processes of checking/correcting data to ensure quality data with the least possible bias or specific exploitation.

The information system

Sharing: expertise and coordination at several levels, for research projects, in support of stock assessments, data delivery, etc.

Data collection

On board and on shore sampling

Data collection

Why do we need to collect these data?

  • Compliance : Regulations from the RFMOs
  • Scientific purpose : Stock assessment (catches and biological parameters)
  • Provide quality data :
    • Data independence: limiting conflict of interest between fishing business and regulation
    • Minimize biases: crew estimations reported in logbook

Data collection

What do we need to collect ?

  • Estimation catch characteristics of the purse seine fisheries (catch and effort by species, size distribution of the catch)
  • Region: Atlantic and Indian ocean
  • Sample area: ICCAT and IOTC fishing ground
  • Only main ports are covered (Abidjan, Dakar and Victoria)
  • Primary sample unit: landing

Data collection - On shore

Declarative data

  • Logbooks data :
    • fishing activities
    • capture quantities
    • target species
    • buoys
  • Landing note informations :
    • capture quantities
    • target species

Data collection - On shore

Sampling at port

  • Technicians during landings at ports
  • Individuals measurement and counting

Data collection - On board

Sampling at sea

  • On board observers
  • Priority : collection of information on discards and bycatch species

Data collection - On board

Example of bycatch

Data storage

Information System

Data storage

Data storage

Data storage

Data storage

Data treatment

What do we do after that ?

Data treatment

Databases corrections

Errors may occur, when:

  • The Excel logbook file is written by the partners, declarative issues

  • Copying this file into the database, entry issues

Data treatment

Databases corrections

Errors may occur, when:

  • The Excel logbook file is written by the partners, declarative issues

  • Copying this file into the database, entry issues

Tools then performs checks to highlight errors so that they can be checked and corrected if necessary.

Data treatment

Databases corrections

Errors may occur, when:

  • The Excel logbook file is written by the partners, declarative issues

  • Copying this file into the database, entry issues

Tools then performs checks to highlight errors so that they can be checked and corrected if necessary.

Data treatment

Databases corrections

Errors may occur, when:

  • The Excel logbook file is written by the partners, declarative issues

  • Copying this file into the database, entry issues

Tools then performs checks to highlight errors so that they can be checked and corrected if necessary.

Data treatment

Tropical Tuna Treament (T3)

Why we need this kind of treatment?

  • Globally in the declarative data, global weight pretty well estimated but significant bias in species composition

  • A lot of input data in different unites or scales

Data treatment

Tropical Tuna Treament (T3)

A succesion of processes for:

  • standardise logbook data
  • standardise sampling data
  • re-assessment of catches (link to the landing data for example) and correction of the species composition

To go deeper: https://ob7-ird.github.io/t3/

Data treatment

Indicators examples

Estimated total catch

Estimated catch and effort

Fishing capacity

Data sharing

Coordination, expertise, and working groups

Data deliveries

Data calls

  • For diverse purposes (research, internships, …)
  • For the DGAMPA (Direction Générale des Affaires Maritimes, de la Pêche et de l’Aquaculture)
    • For France (National Work Plan …)
    • For the European Union (Fisheries Dependent Information, …)
  • For RFMOs
    • Delivery of transversal variables

Expertise

RFMO working groups

For large pelagics, 4 RFMOs

The International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tunas

The Indian Ocean Tuna Commission

Inter- American Tropical Tuna Commission

The Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission

Expertise

RFMO working groups

To simplify, 3 levels of actions:

  • The Working Groups
  • The Scientific Committee
  • The Commission

They can produce recommendation or resolution

Coordination

At European Union scale

  • Regional Coordination Groups
    • Main hub for regional coordination and cooperation
    • Composed of experts appointed by Member States
    • Continuous process
    • Ob7 is involve in the RCG Large Pelagics (https://www.fisheries-rcg.eu/rcg-lp/)
  • Aim: to move from a “national” to a “regional” level.

One specific characteristic

Focus on the EU

  • Normally, each entity negotiates on its side and is responsible for providing data
  • In the case of the EU
    • coordination of all tasks (intermediary with RFMOs)
    • guarantees the monitoring of the fishing quota(s) by European fishermen
    • gives more impact on the international scene

Research support

Involving in projects

Project FISHN’CO, https://www.fisheries-rcg.eu/fishnco/


Project SECWEB, https://www.fisheries-rcg.eu/secweb/


Project CECOFAD et CECOFAD2


…



Thank you for your attention,
do you have any questions?









© FADIO / IRD - Ifremer

https://ob7-ird.github.io/training_aerme/