Ghost Gear Report - 47

FOR GOVERNMENTS
AND INTERNATIONAL
ORGANIZATIONS,
POLICIES AND
REGULATIONS
DESIGNED TO
PREVENT GEAR LOSS
AND ESTABLISH
ADEQUATE ENDOF-LIFE FISHING
GEAR DISPOSAL AND
RECYCLING OPTIONS
ARE APPROPRIATE
PRIORITIES.

situations. Thus, national, regional and global policies and instruments must consider
a combination of approaches, focusing mainly on preventing loss, then on reducing
harm from lost gear (mitigation), either through gear designed to limit ghost fishing or
through retrieval (curative measure), is needed for comprehensive solutions135,136,137.

PREVENTIVE ACTIONS
Preventing fishing gear loss is the ultimate goal of any progressive ghost gear programmes. Prevention covers the spectrum of actions available to seafood stakeholders,
from building awareness to regulatory measures and everything in between. For governments and international organizations, policies and regulations designed to prevent
gear loss and establish adequate end-of-life fishing gear disposal and recycling options
are appropriate priorities.
For example, spatio/temporal separation of different fishing gears, including
the prohibition of certain types of gears are powerful management tools
that can prevent loss of high-risk gear and prevent gear and vessel conflicts
that cause gear loss. Many well-managed fisheries already regulate the separation
of fishing sectors for reasons other than preventing ghost gear138 and some regulations
have been enacted specifically to avoid impacts from lost gear, such as the Western
Central Pacific Fisheries commission prohibition of large-scale driftnets139.
Fishing gear marking, both for visibility and for owner identification is an effective
means to reduce gear conflict, loss, and facilitate recovery and identification of legal vs.
illegal fishing.
Innovative solutions to end-of-life fishing gear disposal and recycling hold
promise in reducing the amount of fishing gear discarded in the ocean.
Many ongoing programmes, such as the Healthy Seas partnership with Aquafil and
the National Fish and Wildlife Fishing for Energy Program are collecting end-of-life
gear. Also, they are establishing supply chains and market demand for end-of-life gear
from fisheries around the world that do not have adequate disposal options140,141. The
partnership between WWF-Peru and Bureo is an example of a recycling scheme providing artisanal fishers with responsible options for end-of-life gear disposal where none
existed before142.
The current actions of the European Commission and its directive on single use plastics
and end-of-life fishing gear sets progressive goals of a minimum collection rate of 50%
and a recycling target of 15%, both to be met by 2025, The directive requires the development of a standard on the circular design of fishing gear and to develop Extended
Producer Responsibility (EPR) requirements for fishing gear producers143.
Building awareness of the problem and of methods to reduce loss through education, training, and outreach would benefit all stakeholders in the seafood supply chain.
In 2017, GGGI developed a global ghost gear database to work with existing data and
improve the way data is collected. Figure 15 demonstrates the significant gaps in data
collected to date.

47
Ghost Gear Report

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Ghost Gear Report
