Acronym AFRAME
Category
Fisheries
Title A framework for fleet and area based fisheries management Programme FP6
Instrument (FP6)
Contact Type (FP7)
Strand (Interreg)
FP6 - Specific Targeted Research Project
Theme (FP7)
Activity Area (FP6)
Regional Area (Interreg)
Action (COST)
Research for Policy Support
Specific Programme (FP7)
NA
Funding source European Coordinator Marina Santurtun Coordinator email msanturtun@azti.es
Coordinator institution
NA
Institutions involved
AAU - Aalborg University (Denmark) ,
CEFAS - Centre for Environment, Fisheries & Aquaculture Science (United Kingdom) ,
FRS - Fisheries Research Services (United Kingdom) ,
IFREMER - French Research Institute for Exploitation of the Sea (France) ,
IMR - Institute of Marine Research (Norway) ,
NA - National Research Council - Institute of Marine Engineering (Italy) ,
IEO - Spanish Institute of Oceanography (Spain) ,
DTU - Technical University of Denmark (Denmark) ,
KU - University of Copenhagen (Denmark) ,
WUR - Wageningen University and Research (Netherlands) ,
Start year 2007 End year 2009 Funding (€) € 2,327,018 Website https://cordis.europa.eu/project/id/44168 Summary The chief objective of AFRAME is to develop a framework for fleet and area-based fisheries management. The project has three research themes: (1) The development and testing of a framework for describing fleet activity in terms of the fisheries in which the fleet participates, and how it allocates its effort across these fisheries; (2) The development of indicator approaches to summarising information and presenting advice in relation to multi-fleet, multi-species fisheries; (3) Stakeholder perceptions and institutional implications of a shift to fleet and area based management. The remit of Working Group on Mixed Fisheries Advice for the North Sea (WGMIXFISH) is to produce management advice and options which take into account the consequences of technical interactions in multistock, multigear fisheries. For this objective the Fcube is used as the method chosen to support this multi species multifleet advice. From the ICES web page the summary of the WGMIXFISH states the following: WGMIXFISH I uses the Fcube approach (after Fleet and Fishery Forecast), a simple model of mixed fisheries which can be used to assess the consistency between management (TAC and/or effort) advice for species caught together, given the availability and accessibility of data. Currently forecasts are performed for the North Sea region using weights of landings and discards and effort disaggregated by fleet and fishery. A simple linear relationship is assumed between effort and fishing mortality and status quo catchability assumed in the projections. Forecasts are produced according to scenarios for what limits the effort in each fleet and the forecasted catch of each species compared to the single species advice for TAC. Results are presented in a unique advice sheet, and those results relevant to each of the species covered are added to the single species advice sheets. The Fcube model in its current form is appropriate for all regions where the majority of species of commercial interest are assessed quantitatively. Even so, expansion into new areas usually requires tailoring of the code to accommodate new species or unique characteristics of the fisheries. There are also many potential enhancements to the Fcube methodology, e.g. replacing the status quo catchability assumption with a model component that accounts for changes in fisher behaviour or technical measures, better addressing stocks lacking a full quantitative assessment, and accounting for uncertainty in factors such as stock-recruit relationship, etc. These issues are currently being addressed within WGMIXFISH II.
Basing advice on fleets or fisheries requires switching focus from a biological unit (a fish stock) to a social one (a fleet or fishery). This is a major shift away from the current TAC-dominated, stock-based approach. The general objective of the AFRAME project is to develop an area- and fleet-based framework that integrates single-species assessment and advice. The framework must be robust to uncertainty caused by, for instance, lack of discard data. Work also includes development of indicators as a basis for setting management targets. Case studies comprise regions in the Northeast Atlantic (e.g. the North Sea), Western Atlantic Waters and the Mediterranean, more precisely fisheries in the North Sea, ICES areas VII & VIII (the channel to the Bay of Biscay), and the Mediterranean, focusing on areas where the need for a fleet-based management is most urgent." The research areas in the AFRAME project are the development of a framework for fleet and area-based management advice; the basis for the scientific advice; and the analysis of stakeholder perspective in relation to these developments.
Keywords
Indicators;
Fisheries management;
Fish stocks;
Marine Region
60
Western Ionian Sea (GSA 19)
15
Bay of Biscay Central (27.VIIIb)
13
Northern North Sea (27.IVa)
3
Marine Region Map
