• Journal of the Korean Society of Fisheries and Ocean Technology
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• v.59 no.4
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• pp.362-376
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• 2023

The IUU Fishing Index is composed of 40 indicators. These indicators were grouped by state responsibilities (flag, coastal, port, and general including market) defined in the FAO IPOA-IUU (2001) and then by type into vulnerability, prevalence, and response. A total of 152 coastal nations was surveyed. Korea's total combined IUU Fishing Index was 2.49 in 2019 and 2.91 in 2021, indicating a drop in the ranking to the third worst out of 152 countries followed by China and Russia in 2021. The indicators that increased the IUU fishing risk in 2021 compared to 2019 included seven indicators of prevalence and two indicators of response while those reducing the risk included one prevalence and one response indicator. The IUU Fishing Index revealed that many fisheries observers and monitoring, control and surveillance (MCS) practitioners active in the waters of RFMOs jurisdiction where Korean distant water vessels operate have mentioned concerns about the compliance with RFMO conservation measures or fishing practices. It suggested that strengthening management intervention in the fishing sector is needed. The primary tool for management is the MCS system. Given the logistical difficulty of oversight from land, air and at-sea, there is a need to enhance MCS strategies through logbook data, at-sea observer and electronic monitoring program. It also suggested that MSC fisheries certification and fisheries improvement projects, which are widely used for improving fishing sector performance, could contribute to the eradication of IUU fishing and the promotion of sustainable distant water fisheries.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Fisheries and Ocean Technology
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• v.60 no.3
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• pp.244-257
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• 2024

Considering the negative impact of IUU fishing on fishery resources and fishery management, a revised approach for estimating risks of the ecosystem-based fisheries assessment (EBFA) of Zhang et al. (2011) was developed that incorporates three components of the IUU (illegal, unreported and unregulated) fishing as penalties. In this study, we introduced ways to develop indicators of IUU fishing suitable for the Korean fishery and apply them to ecosystem-based resource assessment. The indicator for the illegal fishing component was set as the fishing without licenses or permits, and that for the unreported fishing component was set as unreported fishing activities. Indicators for the unregulated fishing component were set as fishing operated by illegal fishing gear, illegal fish capture, fishing operations in prohibited fishing area, and fishing with restrict permits. IUU fishing significantly impacts the stock of target species. Therefore, in this study, the influence of IUU fishing is included in the Species Risk Index (SRI) at the species level, and weights are assigned based on the ratio of the stock, as $SRI={{\sum\limits_j}{\lambda}_j{\cdot}ORI/{\sum\limits_j}{\lambda}_j}+P_f(B_i/B)$. The revised ecosystem-based fisheries assessment method, which considers the impact of IUU fishing, was applied to major fisheries on the south coast of Korea. It is necessary to reduce the non-reporting rate through the expansion of the TAC system and improve the accuracy of statistical compilation. To this end, the electronic fishing reporting system, which is being implemented on all vessels in Korean distant water fishing vessels, should be introduced to the coastal and offshore fisheries as well.