I am grateful to the two external referees Kent D. Gilkinson;(Northwest Atlantic Fisheries Centre,Dept. Fisheries and Oceans, Canada) and Sebastian J. de Groot (Retired Scientist, RIVO Netherlands) and to Rebecca Metzner, FIPP and Ross Shotton, FIRM for helpful comments and suggestions on this manuscript. Special thanks go to Wilfried Thiele and Jeremy Turner for inviting me to the Fishery Technology Service (FIIT) at FAO to do this interesting review on trawl impacts. The staff at the Fisheries Branch Library is thanked for valuable help in providing copies of articles requested.