42 MANAGEMENT OF HIGH SEAS FISHERIES 



essential that any nation engaged in sea fishing should collect ade- 

 quate statistical records of fishing effort and catch, and should con- 

 duct pertinent biological and other investigations to serve as a basis 

 for insuring conservation of the resources being exploited. Scientific 

 information is also indicated as necessary to provide answers for such 

 problems as, "(1) whether regulation of the amount, manner or kind 

 of fishing inay be expected to produce desirable changes in the 

 ainount of catch or its quality. (It is important to determine whether 

 the amount, manner and kind of fishing are such that regulation 

 would maintain or improve the quantity or quality of the sustainable 

 catch, because only in this case is the application of regulatory meas- 

 ures indicated. In order to make such a determination it is often 

 necessary to consider also the fluctuations in the fish population 

 resulting from the effects of environmental factors unconnected with 

 amount, manner or kind of fish.)" 



The conference concluded that scientific information is required 

 to decide the type of regulation which should be enforced to bring 

 about the improvement of the quantity or quality of the catch. 



The scientific information required is then listed, and almost 

 every conceivable type of information concerned with biology of the 

 stocks is indicated as being necessary, although the document there- 

 after stipulates that the scientific information required may include 

 "some or all" of the types listed. At the present time there is no 

 fishery investigation in the world which has provided, or could pro- 

 vide, all the data listed as being necessary under this section of the 

 Rome Conference report. This is apparently recognized in the next 

 section of the report by the statement that "in the case of some fish- 

 eries quite simple investigations will be adequate to determine the 

 need for application of conservation measures and to indicate appro- 

 priate measures to be applied, although in other cases very detailed 

 and extensive investigations will be necessary." The conclusion is 

 that the requirements of each case must be determined by scientific 

 evidence, although "scientific" is not defined, nor is it indicated what 

 kind of evidence would be acceptable. 



The point to be made here is that the laudable enthusiasm gener- 

 ated at the Rome Conference for the extensive utilization of scien- 

 tific evidence in the management of high seas fisheries has, in some 

 cases, tended to impose an impossible burden of proof upon those 

 who, while admitting the ideal of working from totally complete 



