Environmentalists and the groundfish bottom trawl industry on Wednesday announced a landmark agreement on ways to limit the impact of trawl nets on sensitive corals, sponges, and deepsea habitats on the B.C. coast. Photograph by: Handout , ...
Environmentalists and the groundfish bottom trawl industry on Wednesday announced a landmark agreement on ways to limit the impact of trawl nets on sensitive corals, sponges, and deepsea habitats on the B.C. coast.
The agreement sets out total annual bycatch objectives for the entire fleet at 562 kilograms for corals and 322 kilograms for sponges, the lowest levels reported in the past 15 years.
A protocol is in place to alert skippers in the fleet when a trawl bycatch exceeds 20 kilograms of corals or sponges.
The total area of coastline trawled will also be reduced by 20.6 per cent to 31,633 square kilometres, the amount of continental slope habitat trawled to a depth of 200 to 800 metres by 18 per cent to 12,413 square kilometres, and the amount of deepwater habitat trawled to 800 to 1,400 metres by 65 per cent to 1,395 square kilometres.