Monitoring and elimination of bycatch of endangered and conserved species in the NE and high seas Atlantic region

Bycatch, the unintentional capture of non-target marine animals during fishing, is considered one of the greatest threats to marine species globally.

This threat is particularly significant for protected, endangered and threatened species (PETS), including marine mammals, seabirds, turtles and sensitive fish species, with their bycatch threatening marine ecosystem health.

While bycatch of PETS is recognized as a significant issue, advances in fully understanding risks to PETS have been limited, due to current inability to effectively monitor wide ranging, highly mobile and cryptic species. There has been further lack in advancement in approaches to reduce such risks.

These issues all hinder Member States ability to eliminate and significantly reduce bycatch.

MarineBeacon will respond to these challenges, working across a regional seas scale to identifying where significant gaps in understanding lie, and adopt innovative approaches to produce the knowledge and tools to better understand bycatch risk and vulnerability.

Next generation monitoring tools will be produced and developed to improve understanding of the distribution and abundance of PETS in addition to the levels in which they interact with fisheries.

Cutting-edge mitigation tools and techniques will then be extensively tested across diverse fisheries and regions to ensure transferable outputs are generated to significantly mitigate against bycatch risk.

MarineBeacon will facilitate the uptake and adoption of its targeted outputs by policy, management, and industry by adopting a stakeholder centered approach, engaging and collaborating with stakeholder throughout the project to producing best acceptable solutions.

Importantly, MarineBeacon will ensure long-term applicability and impact of outputs beyond the lifetime of the project through the production of a suite of decision support tools to ensure all measures to better monitor PETS and mitigate against bycatch risk are effectively targeted.