Norway has taken a lead in fisheries transparency as the first European nation to make public fishing vessel tracking data on the Gloabal Fishing Watch online resource.
Since 2019, Norwegian fishing vessel movements have been available on the Fisheries Directorate website.
The vessel tracking system currently covers around 600 fishing vessels of at least 15 meters in length, mainly operating in Norwegian waters and the northeast Atlantic Ocean. This number is set to increase in future, as Norway seeks to require all commercial fishing boats to regularly broadcast their position via its monitoring system.
Norway joins a growing number of countries, from Ecuador to Papua New Guinea, that are sharing their vessel monitoring data on our map.
‘Wild living marine resources are a common good and belong to everyone. When a commercial fishing fleet is licensed to utilise this common asset, we are obliged and committed to share fisheries data documenting the environmental footprint of commercial fishing activity,’ said Directorate of Fisheries director general Frank Bakke-Jensen.
‘We hope that others will follow this approach and share more fisheries data.’
