Tunabio: biological traits of tropical tuna and bycatch species caught by purse seine fisheries in the Western Indian and Eastern Central Atlantic Oceans

Along with the development of the tropical tuna purse seine fishery from the 1960s in the Atlantic Ocean and from the 1980s in the Indian Ocean, many projects and studies have been conducted to improve knowledge about the biology, migrations, and dynamics of the stocks of target and non-target (i.e., bycatch) species taken in these fisheries. Since the 2000s, the European Union (EU) has been supporting Member States in the collection of biological data on species caught by their purse seine and pole and line fisheries, thus making it possible to have long-time series of data.

These data are essential to monitor the status of the fisheries and fuel the assessment models used by the tuna Regional Fisheries Management Organisations (tRFMOs) for the sustainable management and conservation of the fish stocks under their mandate. We combined historical (1974-1999) and current (2003-2020) data sets on the biology of tropical tunas and bycatch fish caught by large-scale purse seiners in the Eastern Atlantic Ocean (EAO) and Western Indian Ocean (WIO).