Technical and Meeting Reports | International Seafood Sustainability Foundation
Purse seine vessels account for about 66% of the world’s tuna catch. However, the number of purse seiners operating in the various oceans is not available from a single source. Focusing on large-scale purse seiners (defined here as having 335 m3 fish hold volume or greater) that target tropical tunas, we calculate there are 696 such vessels with a combined fishing capacity of over 874,000 m3. The number of these vessels increased by about 1.5% during the past year.