

A number of electronic monitoring (EM) technologies have been applied to fisheries monitoring. Within the North Pacific, video technology is used for estimating catch and discard for fisheries management and monitoring for compliance with regulations.
In 2018 NOAA Fisheries developed regulations to allow small fixed gear vessels in partial coverage to opt into the EM selection pool for the calendar year rather than carrying an observer. The data collected from this coverage is used to obtain catch and discard information from these vessels. More information can be found in final rule to integrate electronic monitoring into the North Pacific Observer Program.
* This program information constitutes the Small Entity Compliance Guide required under section 212 of the Small Business Regulatory Enforcement Fairness Act of 1996.
Electronic Monitoring is currently being used as a compliance monitoring tool in several catch share programs in Alaska.
For more information about EM as a compliance monitoring tool, please see the Inspections tab within Catch Weighing and Monitoring.
NOAA Fisheries, working with the North Pacific Fishery Management Council, has developed two guiding documents regarding Electronic Monitoring and Electronic Reporting (EM/ER):
NOAA Fisheries works with the Council's EM Workgroup to integrate EM tools for catch estimation.
Video for Compliance Monitoring and general Electronic Monitoring questions:
Vessel Owner Electronic Monitoring Selection Pool questions: