The policies devised to help adjust the fishing capacity of
Taiwan’s distant water tuna fisheries are based on strategies
including the ‘‘Restriction on the Construction of Vessels’’, ‘‘Vessel
Elimination Mechanism’’, and a vessel buyback program or fishing
moratorium. In addition to the ad-hoc ‘‘Restriction on the Construction
of Vessels’’ and ‘‘Vessel Elimination Mechanism’’ implemented
at different stages of the period as described above, the
government announced, in 1991, the general implementation of
the policy ‘‘Restriction on the Construction of Vessels’’ for all
fishing vessels including tuna fishing vessels. The Recommendation
No. 05-02 passed by ICCAT in 2005 further forced Taiwan to
dismantle 183 tuna long-line vessels (constituting 30% of the
original 614 large scale long-line tuna vessels) between 2005 and
2007. The government also planned to decrease the number of
small-scale tuna long-line vessels and trawlers. Therefore, the
‘‘Operation procedures for the reduction of trawlers over 100 t
and longline vessels between 20–100 t for the period from 2007
to 2009’’ was established as part of the vessel buyback program in
2007. During 2007, a total of 5 longline vessels between 20 and
100 t were purchased and removed from the industry.