Technological innovations in fishing gear including modified hooks, turtle excluder devices, and acoustic pingers are substantially reducing bycatch of non-target species including marine mammals, turtles, and seabirds.
Bycatch reduction technology offers some of the most cost-effective interventions for reducing the welfare suffering of non-target marine animals. Technologies that prevent capture rather than requiring post-capture release avoid the injury, exhaustion, and mortality associated with entanglement. The challenge is ensuring adoption across global fishing fleets through a combination of regulation, incentives, and certification requirements. Technology alone is insufficient without enforcement, as fishing operations that bypass bycatch reduction devices continue to cause preventable welfare harm.