Project on new FAD designs to avoid entanglement of by-catch species, mainly sea turtles, in the Spanish purse seine fishery

A Pilot Project executed by the company Albacora and monitored by the Instituto Espanol de Oceanografia (IEO4) is currently running in the Indian Ocean. Since the 15th May 2005 two purse seine vessels and two auxiliary vessels had started the operations on new FAD design to avoid entanglement of by catch species, mainly sea turtles, and acoustic selectivity.

The objective of the Pilot Project is to improve the selectivity and the bycatch incidence of the purse seine fishing on FADs where the impact on stocks of the most sensitive species (bigeye and yellowfin) and on the ecosystem (bycatches) is of certain concern. Experiments will be undertaken with several prototypes of artificial floating objects and their performance will be analysed, to find a new technique that will reduce bycatches (particularly of sea turtles) without reducing aggregation capability of FADs for target species.

Acoustic data will be collected using up-to-date devices (sonar and scientific echosounders) and subsequently analysed to establish criteria that will provide information for an eventual reduction of juvenile catch of tropical tunas (yellowfin, and essentially, bigeye), based on possible acoustic selectivity. The Pilot Project will have a duration of ten months. A month of preparation of protocols and observers' formation, six months for data collection on board the vessels, and approximately three months for data analysis.