Data collection and management for a groundfish study fleet

A study fleet is a subset of vessels participating in a fishery that reports detailed data that is used to characterize the entire fishery. These data can then be used to generate spatially-explicit assessments of commercially important species and foster the development of more sustainable fisheries. The technologies for collecting and reporting data from a study fleet is important, as is the way in which fishermen and management scientists utilize the system. A pilot groundfish study fleet has been established in the Gulf of Maine by CFER to evaluate a novel reporting system. This paper describes the electronic logbook and data reporting system developed for this multi-species application and the Web-based interface used by fishermen to enter data on their fishing operation and to retrieve GIS maps of their reported data. The issues associated with the recruiting of study fleet participants are also discussed. The protection of proprietary interests is very important to fishermen, and data management techniques are needed that will protect such interests if accurate reporting is expected. The distrust that often exists between industry and federal authorities suggests that a study fleet may not be useful unless the data are archived by an independent organization that pledges to maintain the ownership rights of each fisherman. If properly set up, the structure will encourage detailed and accurate reporting and will facilitate the generation of reports useful to the fisherman. These reports effectively compensate the fisherman for the effort required in entering the data.