The global footprint of drifting fish aggregating devices

Abstract

Tuna are among the world’s most valuable marine life and have long been exploited by industrial fisheries. Increasingly, tuna fishing companies have shifted from targeting free-swimming fish to using drifting fish aggregating devices (dFADs): satellite-tracked rafts that move with currents while accumulating fish below. Here, we estimate the global footprint of these devices and track 30 years of progress to mitigate impacts. We estimate that 1.41 million dFAD buoys were released between 2007 and 2021, drifting across at least 134 million square kilometers, or 37% of Earth’s ocean surface. Lost dFADs have stranded in 104 maritime jurisdictions, contributing to coastal pollution and damaging sensitive habitats. Regulatory progress has been made to address data quality, entanglement, and pollution but concerns over unregulated dFAD deployments, unsustainable bycatch, and weak industry accountability persist. Our results demonstrate that the cumulative environmental footprint of dFADs reaches far beyond tuna fishing grounds and remains inadequately mitigated at the global scale.