Overview
The Argentina red shrimp (Pleoticus muelleri) fishery is the main crustacean fishery in Argentina and one of the most important marine resources in the Southwest Atlantic. In accordance with the Fisheries Law, Argentinean provinces have jurisdiction over the exploitation of living resources populating their interior waters and the Argentine sea adjacent to their coasts up to 12 nautical miles (measured from baseline), which allows for the characterization of provincial fisheries.
The fleet operates in the fishery addressed by this FIP, use bottom-trawling nets along the coastal waters of the province of Chubut, mainly in the Restricted Fishing Effort Zone between Punta León and Cabo Dos Bahías. The Rawson Port as its landing point, and it conducts daily fishing trips from November to April (some years October-March). This coastal fleet conducts daily fishing trips from November to April (some years October-March), and as opposed to the larger fleet, its catches are almost monospecific.
During 2021 the onshore red shrimp fishery recorded catches of around 60,000 tonnes; total shrimp catches, both onshore and offshore, for that year were just over 200,000 tonnes (Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock and Fisheries, 2021).
The Argentine red shrimp onshore fishery's current obstacles to becoming more sustainable are mainly related to MSC Principles 2 and 3. This FIP will work to address Principle 2 by characterizing the interaction between the coastal fleet and bycatch species in Chubut’s provincial waters and to support efforts aimed at better understanding the interaction between the fishery and the sea bottom, along with its potential impacts on the ecosystem. With regard to Principle 3, further coordination among the different jurisdictions that define the management of this fishery resource will be achieved, and a formal and regular mechanism for the assessment of the efficacy of the fishery's management system will be available to stakeholders.
The Argentina red shrimp (Pleoticus muelleri) fishery is the main crustacean fishery in Argentina and one of the most important marine resources in the Southwest Atlantic.
The main goal of this FIP is to attain an MSC-certifiable status for the Argentine red shrimp onshore fishery by 2023. The specific objectives for the period 2022-2023 are as follows:
- The adoption of the Contingency Plan by the Federal Fisheries Council.
- The development of a reference point for the fishery closure due to abundance reaching a critical limit.
- Ensuring that INIDEP makes systematic (annual) retrospective evaluations of the stock status.
- Peer review of INIDEP's assessments and recommendations.
- Get the Chubut Secretariat of Fisheries to issue technical reports per season of the Observer Programme, including CPUE evolution, bycatch, interactions with protected species and with the sea bottoms, and evidence of sharks non-finning (already requested to the Secretary).
- Encourage cooperation and data exchange between the provincial and INIDEP Observer Programmes.
- Continue the private On-Board Observer Program while the provincial programme performs in accordance with the certification requirements.
- Incorporate in Resolution 6/2019 a better support for the opening and closing criteria defined therein.
- To satisfy the requirements of social indicators in Fishery Progress.
- In case of restarting the full assessment process, the documents collection and evidence should be satisfied to form a checklist as accurate and comprehensive as possible for the auditors' analysis.
FIP at a Glance
| 21% | 79% |
| 14% | 43% | 43% |
This pie chart represents completed environmental actions. Non-completed environmental actions may contain completed sub-tasks that are not illustrated here. For more information on environmental action progress visit the Actions Progress tab.
- Complete
- Incomplete