The Deep Sea Conservation Coalition and its Aotearoa member groups are seeking an end to deep-sea bottom trawling on seamounts and similar deep-sea features by the New Zealand fishing industry. Since May 2019 over 100,000 people have supported our petitions against this destructive and out-dated form of fishing. For those seamounts and features in orange roughy habitat, this would achieve protection of habitat of particular significance for fisheries management’ as required under the Fisheries Act 1996.
Protecting orange roughy spawning aggregations is an essential measure to align fisheries management with internationaly accepted standards of sustainability. This protection of stocks can be achieved by closing all seamounts and other features in New Zealand waters to bottom trawling, recognising their fundamental role as habitats of particular significance for fisheries management, their high biodiversity value, and their extreme vulnerability to bottom trawling.
Read our submission on Fisheries New Zealand review of sustainability measures for orange roughy (ORH 3B) for 2025/26 here.