31-10-2020

Kattegat rollout of electronic monitoring

Anchor Lab is rolling out electronic monitoring to the majority of the Danish bottom trawling vessels in Kattegat. It was politically decided to introduce electronic monitoring to the majority of the Danish fishery for vessels with bottom trawling gear.

The aim is to document the Norway lobster fishery in Kattegat, including and in particular the bycatch of cod and compliance with the landing obligation. The project will provide detailed records of where each catch operation takes place to document general compliance in relation to discards of cod and other species. The reason for the special focus on cod, is due to the stock (and the quota for cod) being at a dangerously low level.

The Ministry of Food, Agriculture, and Fisheries of Denmark relased a tender in search of a REM provider to supply the monitoring systems and to aid with the monitoring program in general. Anchor Lab is happy and proud to ultimately be the one awarded the tender and look forward to be part of the Danish monitoring strategy.

The concept for the camera project is based on the European Fisheries Control Agency’s Technical guidelines and specifications for the implementation of Remote Electronic Monitoring (REM) in EU Fisheries. The systems installed on the vessels will be recording the catch operation onboard using 4-5 cameras and use sensors for identifying gear operations, light conditions, and water depth. Geofencing will be used to ensure that the systems only record within the Kattegat region and all recorded video and sensor data to be reviewed, will be transmitted wirelessly and automatically over 3G/4G.