South African Deep Sea Trawling Industry Association

Report of the By-catch Management Plan Subcommittee

Synopsis

The Report recommendations are based on seven principles:-

• The Hake Fishery and its joint product species are intertwined and inseparable to one degree or another inasmuch as no species can be caught without others.
• Bycatch is the saleable non-hake species caught in the demersal trawl fishery
• With the possible exception of Maasbanker none of the demersal joint product species can support a discrete stand-alone fishery.
• Bycatch is caught in a semi-targeted manner, at most.
• Joint products should be encouraged - all conservation factors being equal
• Regulations should disrupt ongoing business models as little as possible - all conservation factors being equal
• Hake always remains the prime object of regulation in the demersal fishery . It is corollary that bycatch species can rarely be managed on classical or optimal lines.

The Subcommittee’s suggestions for managing by-catch in the South African trawl fishery are summarised as follows:

• An overall limit on trawl effort in the fleet be governed by an agreed ratio of horsepower to hake quota - by implication this caps the extent of effort that can be deployed on by-catch species in the Industry.
• Precautionary catch limits, based on historical catch data (amongst other factors) be established in consultation with the industry.
• Trigger points to be set, whereby, upon being reached, the Hake Resource Management Working Group can convene to establish the appropriate means by which to curb operators from exceeding the overall precautionary catch limit for the affected by-catch species.
• A provisional seasonal closed area for Kingklip as proposed by M&CM needs to be maintained during the main spawning season subject to an updated assessment.
• That the measures regarding monk and Kingklip are proposed in the spirit of conservative stock management and that the underlying assessments need to be substantiated by further scientific research before any measures are ratified.

The above system is reliant on having up-to-date catch data and the use of a co-management working structure, such as the Resource Management Working Group, to address issues at fairly short notice as they arise.

Report of the Subcommittee for the development of a

By-catch Management Plan

PREAMBLE

This document is inspired by the need to address the issue of bycatch as raised in the MSC Certification Report for the South African Hake Trawl Fishery.
Condition 1 of the Report outlines the need for a general bycatch plan and identifies three fish species, in particular kingklip, kob and monk as the principal candidates for attention regarding measures of bycatch protection in the deep-sea hake and inshore hake/sole trawl sectors. ⁱ

Business stability within a sound conservation framework is one of the Subcommittee’s main guiding principles. There are at this time sixteen active catching groups (or clusters) in the deep-sea sector and a further twelve in inshore trawling. These groupings operate vessels ranging from a single small trawler to fleets of about twenty ships. Many trawlers are freezers and most freezer groupings have established themselves in different market niches. Nearly half the fleet is made up of fresh fish ships most of which are integrated into producing value added packaged processed product. Inclusive of inshore trawling, some twenty five participants have invested in almost as many different business models, each of which is characterised by a differing degree of dependence on area and therefore bycatch, regarding both volumes and species. All conservational issues again being equal, it is the aim of this bycatch management plan to divert existing firms from their legitimate established forms of business as little as possible.

What, for want of a better term, may be called the “bycatch debate” in contemporary fisheries management has been clouded by a confusion of definitions. A tendency to assign wide comprehensive meanings has militated against rational policy formulation, if only because of the universal condemnation and negative connotations that certain categories of fish loosely called “bycatch” have attracted in an environmentally minded world. ⁱⁱ
A variety of definitions have also been applied locally. Thus, in the hake trawl fishery the term bycatch has sometimes meant everything taken up in the net other than the hake landing itself. The difficulty with such an approach is that it conflates product in ready demand with unwanted fish and the subsequent policy may try to address too many different “bycatch” related variables simultaneously. It is simply more effective to deal with fewer policy entities at any one time.

For the present purpose bycatch means the incidental catch of other species associated with hake trawling — more or less twenty varieties of commercially valuable fish, of which six species predominate. The reality is that hake trawling bycatch is the joint product that comes with the whole trawling package so to speak and it has always been a valuable adjunct of the fishery.

Despite the well documented inevasibility of the bycatches in trawling, it would be wrong to suggest that a fisher cannot influence the bycatch incidence. Certain fishing behaviors and strategies can enhance the catch proportion of some species. In other words, certain bycatch species are amenable and subject to “semi-targeting” under specific conditions.

Another principle underlying this plan is that by far the greater part of the secondary species making up trawl bycatch are desirable from a general welfare perspective. The trawl bycatch plays a role in national food security. Fish such as horse mackerel, mackerel, snoek and ribbon are a source of affordable high quality animal protein particularly for lower income groups. ⁱⁱⁱ Trawled product provides for a greater range of consumer choice in a market traditionally lacking in variety. ^iv A substantial part of the balance earns foreign exchange, monk and kingklip in particular. Far from being discouraged, joint product bycatch should be supported provided no conservational issues arise. But restrictive measures are always justified where the underlying viability of a specific fish stock is shown to have come into question.

A further principle is that, the various trawl bycatch species, inclusive of kingklip, monk and snoek are so closely integrated with demersal trawling operations and/or of such a transitory nature and are of such a limited extent in relative abundance that they cannot support discrete independent economically viable trawl fisheries. It is notable that Maasbanker, the one fishery identified as a stand alone fishery, exhibits a far closer inter relationship with Hake than was generally thought when first it was established.

Lastly it is axiomatic that bycatch regulation policy should recognise the impossibility of optimizing the output for each jointly caught species within a single fishery. The South African Demersal fishery is founded and based on Hake and bycatch management has to work around that precept. ^v  The Subcommittee reiterates that this principle is always subordinate to responsible fishing practices.

BASIS FOR SPECIFIC MEASURES

Each of the three named species are caught under very different circumstances and, inasmuch as each is problematic, each therefore will need to be addressed by a distinct course of action. Catches of kingklip and monkfish ^vi must be better controlled because the high market profile gained by these species results in some degree of targeting and the Department’s preliminary assessments indicate that both resources are depressed in some areas at least.

The Subcommittee has wondered whether the science underlying the nomination of kingklip and monkfish as critical species is not rather tenuous and whether it will withstand scrutiny but it still believes that between MCM and Industry sufficient data exist to establish a basis for treating and monitoring these sensitive secondary species. That said, the Subcommittee also feels hampered by inability to access the trawl database at an appropriate level of detail. Good individual company catch data were last available in 1998/9 and it is proposed that the Association should at least try to gather relevant data independently of the trawl data base.

Regarding the three named species the Subcommittee concurred on a general basis for bycatch protection measures as follows

1. such measures will be implemented purely on the basis of indicative scientific findings
2. species bycatch controls must not take the form of discrete access rights to the relevant species
3. such rules as are put in place must not be conducive to any form of “olympic” fishing behaviour
4. the recognized industrial bodies will pool catch data and engage with MCM in order to develop effective schemes of arrangement
5. both SADSTIA and SECIFA are the recognized industrial bodies for demersal trawling.

GENERAL MEASURES IN THE DEEPSEA HAKE TRAWL SECTOR

It is a given that catch and effort are directly related. Hence effort limitation must play an integral role in curbing excessive catching or targeting. No operator should have a blank cheque to deploy unlimited effort. The relative marginal cost of using surplus catching power can be very low in some circumstances, especially in the case of second hand vessels, and large surpluses of catching power are a temptation for abuse. It seems reasonable to place a cap on fishing power roughly in accordance with the quantum of hake rights being exploited by each “cluster”. The Subcommittee believes that the main concern regarding bycatch arises from a perception that the fishing power deployed by some individuals is not reasonably matched to their underlying hake rights. An effort constraint of some kind could prevent inordinate diversions of fishing effort away from hake on to joint products now and in future.

Specific effort control would not be novel to the hake fishery. In 1990 the Chief Director Sea Fisheries raised concern about the excess capacity in the hake trawl fishery and introduced an effort control formula. SADSTIA’s proposal, based on past experience, was simply to use the installed horsepower as the most practical and effective parameter to link effort and hake quotas. The main industry participants agreed to limit main engine horse power to 1 hp per ton hake quota on an all year round basis. The then reasoning behind a more favorable ratio for smaller companies was to assist them at the time to catch and develop a market for other species in order to enhance the viability of these businesses. The larger established companies concentrated on hake to feed capital intensive shore based value adding facilities. The idea was that effort would constitute a simple secondary control and consequently no allowance was recommended for performance enhancing or inhibiting factors.

Taking all by-catch including the species identified by the MSC into consideration the Subcommittee is of the view that effort limitation running in parallel with specific bycatch controls would be the most effective bycatch management tool available in the hake trawl sector. The Subcommittee recommends 1 shaft horsepower per ton of 2004 hake quota per year as a secondary control variable. A formula of a maximum shaft horsepower per hake quota ton, would go a long way towards restricting semi-targeted fishing on any by-catch species simply because it would restrict the time available for deployment on bycatch.

 Mechanical Devices
The use of exclusion and escapement devices that prevent unwanted fish from coming up on deck has been raised as a possibility in connection with bycatch constraint. Although this technology is useful in other respects and should definitely be researched in order to ascertain the potential benefit the Subcommittee feels that it would serve no particular purpose in addressing the limitation of species of bycatch as defined. The industry has already done a lot of research in this area, and collaboration with M & CM needs to be undertaken. In this regard number of Industry and company initiatives still await response from M & CM

 Discards and High Grading
Notwithstanding the Subcommittee’s decision to deal with bycatch only as strictly defined and to refrain from substantive recommendations regarding the above matters cognizance still has to be taken of the undesirability of these practices. These are largely enforcement and compliance issues. The Subcommittee believes that a more systematic deployment of the existing observer program can contribute greatly to preventing these practices in local trawling operations (especially by way of advanced statistical methods). In addition the Members of the Association should formally eschew high grading by way of a formal code of practice to be realised in companies disciplinary codes for their trawlermen.

SPECIFICS

 Because kingklip are mainly resident on rocky terrain inaccessible to conventional trawling only small volumes are consistently caught throughout the year except for a window period during late August, September and October. The fish congregate at this time largely around the 400 metre depth contour on the Chalk Line Grounds — almost certainly to spawn. Approximately 1000 ton is caught by the demersal fleet when spawning kingklip migrate across the traditional trawl grounds in the critical region., Most of the area is actually very rocky and as such affords a large measure of environmental protection from trawlers.

Historically, trawl catches of kingklip had remained fairly constant until the demersal longline onslaught during 1986 – 1990, after which a moratorium was placed on all longline activities because of the demonstrated danger to the resource. When the experimental hake longline demersal fishery re-commenced in 1994, a 10% bycatch restriction was placed on kingklip catches, this condition still applies today.

Kob
Our remarks on kob are made with the proviso that these species are subject to overriding comment by the South East Coast Inshore Fishing Association into whose scope kob falls. Silver kob is caught as a winter bycatch in the inshore sole (and hake) trawl fishery. The inshore trawl catch is thus both time and area bound with the greater fishery. The annual mean bycatch of all species of trawl caught kob runs at 1.5% of the inshore trawl catch and in the region of 5% of the total annual take of kob.

 Monk
Monk has always been a classical by-catch of the hake fishery, especially on the West Coast and as such it has always been accepted as an important component of the hake trawling business averaging, about 4% of total hake catch across the entire fleet. The traditional figure increases with targeting and in consequence the current level for deep-sea hake trawling has risen to 6% with at least three companies directing a higher than average proportion of effort specifically on hake/monk . This increase alone has led to concern in some quarters. Some industry members have monitored CPUE and fish size of monk and they have not observed anything to give cause for concern.

 Monk landings have risen over the last twelve years but the Subcommittee’s perception remains that the resource is not currently under threat. Some objective indicators reinforce the perception:-

• The size/length frequency shows no noticeable change over the past 12 years strongly suggestive of stock stability.
• No significant shift has occurred in the landings of large category fish indicating a healthy spawning stock and a stable resource in water depth greater then 400 m.
• CPUE and annual catches have not varied significantly since 1998 ^viii during which period fishing methods have remained constant — this suggests no biomass induced downtrend has occurred in the period.
• Despite increased pressure on the monk resource since 1990 no significant changes in availability or size composition has been detected in the fishery.
• The mean tail mass of the South African by-catch monk fishery is approximately twice that of the Namibian monk fishery, which is interpreted as indicative of a healthy stock.
• juvenile monkfish are virtually absent when using a minimum 110 mm cod-end mesh indicating that standard South African gear promotes efficient monk escapement. In contrast the Namibian gear 75 mm mesh results in very high numbers of small and juvenile fish.

The monk resource appears stable at an annual catch of some 7000 to 8000 tons. It bears reiterating that, not withstanding the present stability, monk trawling cannot be envisaged as a separate discrete fishery — it will always need to be caught in combination with hake allocations. The fact that hake and monk are inextricably intertwined implies that a pre-cautionary catch limit could be counterproductive. The targeting of Monk requires very specific trawling techniques together with experienced crew, yet the hake component always remains the major portion of the catch. The marginal profitability of searching for Monk together with the unavoidable bycatch requirement of 5400 tons for the Hake fishery will not render a separate Monk fishery viable.

GENERAL RECOMMENDATIONS

Effort ^x
Kingklip and monk are not necessarily the most important issues in the hake trawl bycatch sector. It is probably more important to address the issue of bycatch as a whole. It is recommended that the FEAC implement a form of effort control, such as has been used in the past, to emplace some kind of cap preventing participants in the deep-sea hake trawl fishery from deploying inordinate surpluses of effort available for targeting secondary species. A CPUE effort control formula needs to be managed in parallel with existing hake quota control.^xi An adjustable CPUE formula was discussed. This would go against the principle of introducing this measure to protect the resource should it come under threat. Effort needs to remain fixed during times of abundance and poor fishing in line with the established Constant Effort Approach to the management of the hake fishery.

Voluntary Restraint
For the past few years it has been known that some form of bycatch regulations will be implemented. As a result current landings could be skewed from the normal natural business models companies adopted before such pressure may have come to bear. Therefore a neutral period needs to be adopted.

The hake trawl fleet will be assessed company by company for the period 1998 – 2002 so that a mean catch composition per company can be established for the six major trawl bycatch species. This process will then set standards for an upper catch limit for each bycatch element and each participant. ^xii

New PDI participants, with less then 1500 tons and insufficient performance during the agreed period, may be allowed to fish up to a maximum of the industry average for the species in question, subject to attaining a performance level within 12 months.

 Priority
The Subcommittee recommends as a priority that the higher value bycatch species should be specifically regulated on a non-allocational basis — species with a lower unit value do not call for specific forms of regulation at this time.

SPECIFIC RECOMMENDATIONS

 Monk
Taking cognizance of all indicators leads to a conclusion that controls for monk should be subsumed in the general recommendations. The Subcommittee recommends a precautionary maximum catch limit in line with the replacement yield of 7000 tons failing further scientific research on the population dynamics of monk, which is sorely needed. The precise means of managing the PMCL, needs to be determined in discussions with the Department but the Subcommittee is mindful of the principle that established business models of hake trawl rights holders should be preserved. The Subcommittee also proposes that each company be limited to the average of their Monk catches for the years 1998 – 2002 .

 Kob
In the absence of recommendations from SECIFA, in regard to controlling landings of small Kob by designated sole vessels, the Subcommittee suggests that a winter closed area be considered for some of the offshore banks at Cape Infanta and Witsands. Such an approach will curtail the landing of small kob substantially.

 Effort limitation
The Subcommittee proposes that the suggested deepsea trawl horsepower limitation formula be enforced.

CONCLUSION

The Subcommittee adopts the policy of encouraging bycatch species within conventional resource conservation constraints on the grounds that the production and supply of joint products is socially desirable and commendable. The integrity of each stock remains paramount in all circumstances and intervention will be mandatory wherever a resource is compromised.

Regarding hake trawl fisheries the allocation of discrete fishing rights for joint product or bycatch species in terms of Section 18 of the Marine Living Resources Act is rejected because of the immense legal, structural and organizational problems that would ensue. Such are the many potential negative consequences within the context of South African fishery structures that individual or even global measures of the kind need to be avoided even at considerable cost.

The Subcommittee strongly recommends that potential problems be addressed primarily by instituting appropriate forms of overall effort control for the hake trawl fishery and that specific difficulties be approached on a consultative interactive precautionary basis treating each case on its merits in real time. The Subcommittee recommends a structure similar to the Sea Management Committees that have worked well in other Sectors.
^xiii That said the Subcommittee feels that a specific temporary area closure is needed for seasonal catches of kingklip.

^v This comment is prompted by an alternative vision of bycatch control relying on a series of bycatch MSYs as primary fishery management objectives. The Subcommittee is of the view that bycatch rules need to be quite flexible in the light of an overriding need for strict hake management. Fishing mortality inevitably lowers the abundance (depletes) of a resource and it may even be true that bycatch yields are unsustainable by strict MSY standards. The trick is to decide what level of bycatch depletion is acceptable and if necessary introduce mechanisms that ensure that the norm is not overstepped. It could sometimes be possible that stock reduction is severe by target species standards — what really matters is that the depletion is reasonable.

^vi Trawled kob must also be addressed but the Subcommittee believes that SECIFA is best able to deal with the specifics.

^vii For example, were the cumulative catch rate of snoek to exceed say x tons the HRMWG might impose area closures for a critical period.

^viii Monk exhibit notable seasonal fluctuations in availability

^ix Monk catches have been much reduced in 2003. The subcommittee feels that this reduction should not be attributed to a sudden change in stock abundance. A serious drop in market demand and greater dedication of the available effort to pure hake trawling are the two extraneous factors that caused the change.

^x Despite its theoretical virtues effort has been frequently observed to fail in systems where it constitutes the primary means of control. Effort controls invariably take the form of setting a factor input such as vessel length, size or manpower and the main reasons for their shortcomings may be summarised as follows.

1. the selected factors are often highly substitutable by other (uncontrolled) inputs
2. the designated form of effort is often very “lumpy” as such it can be a very blunt instrument unsuited to sophisticated systems of fishing rights especially where the TAC is subdivided amongst a number of independent relatively small lots.
3. the parameters are hardly ever well calibrated.