Reducing observer coverage Sample Clauses

Reducing observer coverage. At the 23rd Meeting of the Parties in September 2010, the Parties discussed the possibility of reducing the current observer coverage to reduce the costs of the AIDCP, and requested that the Board examine this issue. Dr. Xxxxxx Xxxx, of the IATTC staff, presented a review of observer coverage by regional fisheries management organizations. He stressed that reducing this coverage would be problematic if monitoring compliance of dolphin mortality limits remains an objective of the AIDCP. It is very important in considering alternate coverage levels that the objective of the observer program must be clearly defined. While lower coverage levels may be valid for estimating dolphin bycatch, the IATTC is responsible for monitoring more species than just dolphins. For example, the level of coverage required to accurately estimate the bycatch of a rarely-caught species would necessarily be higher than that required for a frequently-caught species. To obtain good estimates for all species would require a level of observer coverage that would be determined by the distributions of the rarest species of interest, and observer coverage would necessarily be high. If observer coverage were to be reduced, statistical procedures would once again be required to estimate dolphin mortalities in the fishery. Prior to full coverage of the international fleet, the sampling coverage by the IATTC and national programs had increased over time, reducing the estimation error. Coverage levels of 10% to 33% have been estimated as adequate to reduce some biases in the estimates, and to provide a reasonable level of precision for some species, based on simulations or on the characteristics of the statistical distributions. One critical assumption, however, is that there is no “observer effect” - that is, all vessels would operate the same and have the same mortality rates regardless of whether an observer is aboard or not.