Report of the Ad Hoc Working Group on Coastal Demersal Fish Stocks from Mauritania to Liberia

Table of Contents

PROJECT FOR THE DEVELOPMENT OF FISHERIES IN THE EASTERN CENTRAL ATLANTIC	CECAF/ECAF SERIES 78/8 (En)
FISHERY COMMITTEE FOR THE EASTERN CENTRAL ATLANTIC

Held at the

"CENTRE DE RECHERCHES OCEANOGRAPHIQUES DE DAKAR-THIAROYE"
14-19 November 1977

FOOD AND AGRICULTURE ORGANIZATION OF THE UNITED NATIONS
UNITED NATIONS DEVELOPMENT PROGRAMME
Rome, 1979

The designations employed and the presentation of material in this publication do not imply the expression of any opinion whatsoever on the part of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations concerning the legal status of any country, territory, city or area or of its authorities, or concerning the delimitation of its frontiers or boundaries.

The copyright in this book is vested in the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. The book may not be reproduced, in whole or in part, by any method or process, without written permission from the copyright holder. Applications for such permission, with a statement of the purpose and extent of the reproduction desired, should be addressed to the Director, Publications Division, Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, Via delle Terme di Caracalla, 00100 Rome, Italy.

© FAO, 1979

This electronic document has been scanned using optical character recognition (OCR) software and careful manual recorrection. Even if the quality of digitalisation is high, the FAO declines all responsibility for any discrepancies that may exist between the present document and its original printed version.

Table of Contents

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

1. INTRODUCTION

2. FISHERIES OF THE AREA

2.1 Canoe fisheries
2.2 Local semi-industrial and industrial fisheries
2.3 Non-local distant fisheries

3. DISTRIBUTION OF STOCKS

3.1 Nature of bottoms in the area between 19°N and 4°30'N

3.1.1. Muddy bottoms.
3.1.2. Hard sandy bottoms
3.1.3. Rocky banks
3.1.4. Sandy-mud bottom at the edge of the continental shelf

3.2 Relationship between the type of bottom and distribution of demersal fish species

4. AVAILABILITY OF DATA FOR THE GROUPS OF DEMERSAL STOCKS

5. BIOLOGY OP THE STOCKS

5.1 General
5.2 Hydrography and its influence on the life cycle of demersal fish stocks in the area
5.3 Migrations and reproduction
5.4 Latitudinal stratification of stocks

6. DESCRIPTION OF FISHERIES IN THE SHERBRO DIVISION (34.3.3)

6.1 General
6.2 Liberia
6.3 Sierra Leone

7. DESCRIPTION OF FISHERIES IN THE CAPE VERDE COASTAL DIVISION (34.3.1)

7.1 Guinea
7.2 Guinea Bissau
7.3 Senegal/Gambia area and southern Mauritania

8. OCCURRENCE OF BALISTES CAPRISCUS

8.1 Exploitation
8.2 Result of acoustic and trawling surveys
8.3 Causes of the B. capriscus bloom

9. ANALYSIS OF CATCH PER UNIT EFFORT DATA

9.1 The Sherbro Division
9.2 The Senegal/Gambia area

10. ASSESSMENT OF THE VARIOUS STOCKS

11. STATE OF EXPLOITATION OF THE DEMERSAL RESOURCES

11.1 Cape Verde Division
11.2 Sherbro Division

12. MANAGEMENT ADVICE

13. RECOMMENDATIONS

14. REFERENCES

Appendix 1: List of participants

Appendix 2: Programme

Appendix 3: Availability of catch data for coastal soft bottom stocks

Appendix 4: Availability of catch data for coastal hard bottom stocks

Appendix 5: Availability of catch data for demersal species inhabiting the edge of the continental slope

Appendix 6 Inventory of biological data on major demersal fish species off West Africa

Appendix 7: La pêche des chalutiers ivoiriens dans les zones FAO 34.3.1 (littoral Cap Vert) et FAO 34.3.3 (Sherbro) (A. Caverivière)

Appendix 8: Quelques informations sur la pêche chalutière dans les eaux guinéennes et son potentiel (S. Zupanovic et M. Cissé)

Appendix 9: La pêche démersale au Sénégal: historique et potentiel (S. Garcia, F. Lhomme, J. Chabanne et C, Franqueville)

Appendix 10: Indices d'abondance des poissons démersaux côtiers dans les différentes zones de pêche fréquentées par les chalutiers ivoiriens (A. Caverivière)

Appendix 11: Evaluation les potentiels de capture des espèces démersales dans les divisions COPACE Cap Vert et Sherbro (F. Domain)

Appendix 12: Première évaluation acoustique des ressources démersales du plateau continental de la Guinée Bissau (B. Stequert et F. Gerlotto)