Up to US$3.5 million in annual funding is being made available to entrepreneurs and others developing new technologies that increase the sustainability of fisheries around the world by the San Francisco, California-based Schmidt Marine Technology Partners, a Schmidt Family Foundation programme.
The project is also being funded by two anonymous philanthropic groups.
“Fisheries challenges are often complex, and many of the greatest threats to the world’s fisheries involve politics, human behaviour, and information deficits,” Schmidt Marine Technology Partners Director, Mark Schrope, said. “But we believe that some of these challenges can and should be addressed through improved technologies.”
Schmidt Marine maintains that while fishing, fisheries science and fisheries conservation are rife with conflict, controversy and complications, fisheries can become more sustainable with new and improved tools.
These, it offers, could range from new types of fishing gear or gear improvements, to new methods of gathering fisheries-related data, to the application of existing tools in new ways.
“Ocean technology is at a critical point. While in many ways ocean health is declining rapidly, current technological capabilities make it possible to envision—to a greater extent than ever before—new ways to enable substantial improvements,” Schrope said. “And there are numerous success stories that we can celebrate and learn from.”
While the initiative does not have a specific regional focus, Schmidt Marine advises that it is seeking technologies that have the potential to enable improvements in multiple regions, especially areas where management and monitoring resources are most limited.
Selected projects will reflect a strong understanding of the political structures of target deployment regions, it said. Additionally, it wants the projects to be well grounded in both the realities of fishing and fisheries science and management, and in the case of new gear or gear improvements, they should offer benefits to fishermen that make adoption feasible.
The initiative also encourages applications from individuals and groups who do not typically work on ocean issues, such as companies with technologies for other applications that offer potential in fisheries.
University researchers, non-profit organisations and for-profit companies, including commercial fishing groups, are all eligible to apply.
