Purse Seine Guidebook
The Inter-American Tropical Tuna Commission (IATTC) area of jurisdiction is the eastern Pacific Ocean. IATTC was founded in 1949, making it the oldest tuna commission in the world. The RFMO is relatively small. Its different working groups usually meet on an annual or biannual basis, although smaller groups meet on an ad-hoc basis as required. The IATTC manages transboundary stocks of temperate tuna in coordination with the International Scientific Committee of Tuna and Tuna-like species in the Northern Pacific Ocean (ISC), while tropical tuna are coordinated with the WCPFC.
The Commission applies the precautionary principle to fisheries management. The Commission interprets Maximum Sustainable Yield (MSY) as a target reference point and thus if catches for target species reach the MSY limit, management measures are sought.
Mandatory fisheries data submitted to the Commission include catch-and-effort data and length frequency data. In addition, the Commission holds information on gear, flag, and fish-carrying capacity for several fisheries. IATTC has an extremely comprehensive observer program covering 100% of large purse-seine vessels, although coverage on longline and small purse-seine vessels is not carried out by the secretariat.
