WWF is working with fishers, fisheries managers, seafood traders, and consumers to reform commercial marine fisheries towards long-term sustainability – where seafood is harvested in a way that sustains and protects the marine environment, the species within it, and the people who depend on them.
Smart Fishing
Smart Fishing is a WWF Global Initiative
WWF's Smart Fishing Initiative particularly seeks to move four major, global fishery types – whitefish, tuna, shrimp, and forage (or reduction) – towards long-term sustainability.
Work centres on:
Work centres on:
- Reducing bycatch
- Reducing illegal, unregulated and unreported (IUU) fishing
- Increasing public awareness and preferential purchasing of sustainable seafood in key markets
- Engaging the processing and retail sector to demand legal, traceable and sustainable seafood
- Addressing the key drivers of overfishing, including private and public finance
- Generating solutions that address the very real and difficult socio-economic issues underpinning and fuelling overfishing.
Deepwater redfish (Sebastes mentella) caught in a fishing net.
Overfishing is the single biggest threat to ocean life.
As the number, size, and power of fishing boats has grown, an increasing number of commercial fisheries are being fished to the point of collapse.
Destructive fishing practices, such as bottom trawling, are damaging and destroying sensitive marine habitats
And millions of nontarget fish and other ocean dwellers are incidentally caught and killed each day as bycatch.
This has pushed the largest living space on Earth to its limit – threatening not just marine habitats and species but also the livelihoods of coastal communities, human health and food security.
As the number, size, and power of fishing boats has grown, an increasing number of commercial fisheries are being fished to the point of collapse.
Destructive fishing practices, such as bottom trawling, are damaging and destroying sensitive marine habitats
And millions of nontarget fish and other ocean dwellers are incidentally caught and killed each day as bycatch.
This has pushed the largest living space on Earth to its limit – threatening not just marine habitats and species but also the livelihoods of coastal communities, human health and food security.
The choice is clear – it is either SMART fishing or NO fishing! If we go on overfishing there will simply be no commercially viable stocks left.
More information
Smart Gear
Tough EU Regulation against illegal fishing
Under a new EU Regulation, from 1 January 2010 all fish imports into the EU will be banned unless the importing company can show the fish comes from non-IUU sources through robust traceability systems. Furthermore, fisheries in countries with IUU fishing problems, such as Russia and China, will face restrictions and be entered on a blacklist.
This is a major win in the fight against IUU fishing, given that the EU imports 60% of its fish, much of it from Chinese processors, and is the world’s second-largest importer of fish.
WWF lobbied EU governments and Members of the European Parliament to vote in favour of the Regulation, which is changing the face of global fisheries.
This is a major win in the fight against IUU fishing, given that the EU imports 60% of its fish, much of it from Chinese processors, and is the world’s second-largest importer of fish.
WWF lobbied EU governments and Members of the European Parliament to vote in favour of the Regulation, which is changing the face of global fisheries.
Latest news
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High-level call for green revolution should be heeded, says WWF
Gland, Switzerland: The UN High-Level Panel for Global Sustainability call for a radical redesign of the global economy for a healthy environment and ...
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High-level call for green revolution should be heeded, says WWF
Gland, Switzerland: The UN High-Level Panel for Global Sustainability call for a radical redesign of the global economy for a healthy environment and ...
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Wild West Fishing in Distant Waters. EU fisheries policy reform needed.
Brussels, Belgium - A new WWF commissioned study published today strongly suggests that fisheries access agreements with developing countries ...
