Cook Islands Ministry of Marine Resources Action Plan for Sea Turtle Mitigation.

The objective of this Plan is to reduce the impacts sea turtle species of fishing for highly migratory fish species by fishing vessels operating in the Cook Islands offshore tuna fishery. It has been developed to support the Regional Action Plan for Sea Turtle Mitigation implemented by Pacific Islands Forum Fisheries Agency (FFA) member countries in 2008. The Plan is targeted primarily at vessels operating within fishery waters and on high seas areas of the Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission (WCPFC) region. Those flag vessels operating in the EEZ of other Pacific Island States will be subject to terms and conditions applied by the relevant licensing State. The Plan details the three regionally adopted strategies and the consequent national actions to support those strategies: 1. Undertake collection and monitoring of fishery data to improve understanding of the nature, scope and scale of sea turtle/ tuna fishery interactions in order to develop appropriate responses; 2. Conduct research and investigations to obtain information that cannot be acquired ugh monitoring, and test possible mitigation measures; 3. Introduce mitigation measures to encourage/ require that fishers take steps to reduce (a) turtle/fishery interactions and (b) mortality rates resulting from such interactions. It also concerns international cooperation in the framework of RFMOs (SPC, FFA, SPREP and WCPFC) and with the United States.