Fisheries Science Section - Strategy and Remit

The Fisheries Science Section conducts research and development projects that contribute to the assessment, management and sustainable harvest of commercially important finfish and shellfish species.  Staff within the section work with colleagues in other closely related teams to identify where significant 'knowledge gaps' occur and try to establish projects that address them. 

Some projects are relatively short, simple and contained, but others such as stock assessment may involve large, complex work programmes that span many years.  Although the biological sustainability of stocks must always be positioned as a priority and is the topic of much of the work of the section, it is increasingly making efforts to promote the need to incorporate the concepts of social and economic sustainability in the way that resources are managed.

Outputs from the section contribute to local, national and European assessment and management forums involving both science and industry.  The section and overarching department is somewhat unique in that for some time the impact of project outputs are placed before academic progression, but this still demands that the highly applied activities are robust, well managed and impartial.  To this end, significant work that is deemed unsuitable for scientific publication is still subjected to review by a panel of external reviewers.