Data

Global fishing discards by type of fishing gear

What you should know about this indicator

Additional information about this data

Discards are animals thrown back (alive or dead) into the sea after being caught during fishing activities.

This is one subset of 'bycatch': animals that are not the target species but are caught during fishing activities. Some bycatch is still used as human food, or animal feed. The proportion that is not used, and is instead, thrown back into the sea is called 'discards'.

Source

Pérez Roda, M.A. et al. (2019). A third assessment of global marine fisheries discards. FAO Fisheries and Aquaculture. – processed by Our World in Data

Last updated

June 1, 2021

Date range

2014–2014

Unit

tonnes

Links

http://www.fao.org/3/CA2905EN/ca2905en.pdf

Sources and processing

This data is based on the following sources

Pérez Roda, M.A. et al. (2019). A third assessment of global marine fisheries discards. FAO Fisheries and Aquaculture.

Data published by

Pérez Roda, M.A. (ed.), Gilman, E., Huntington, T., Kennelly, S.J., Suuronen, P., Chaloupka, M. and Medley, P. 2019. A third assessment of global marine fisheries discards. FAO Fisheries and Aquaculture Technical Paper No. 633. Rome, FAO. 78 pp.

Retrieved on

June 1, 2021

Retrieved from

http://www.fao.org/3/CA2905EN/ca2905en.pdf

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Citations

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To cite this page overall, including any descriptions, FAQs or explanations of the data authored by Our World in Data, please use the following citation:

“Data Page: Global fishing discards by type of fishing gear”. Our World in Data (2026). Data adapted from Pérez Roda, M.A. et al. (2019).  A third assessment of global marine fisheries discards. FAO Fisheries and Aquaculture.. Retrieved from https://archive.ourworldindata.org/20260512-095313/grapher/fish-discards-gear.html [online resource] (archived on May 12, 2026).

How to cite this data

In-line citationIf you have limited space (e.g. in data visualizations), you can use this abbreviated in-line citation:

Pérez Roda, M.A. et al. (2019).  A third assessment of global marine fisheries discards. FAO Fisheries and Aquaculture. – processed by Our World in Data

Full citation

Pérez Roda, M.A. et al. (2019).  A third assessment of global marine fisheries discards. FAO Fisheries and Aquaculture. – processed by Our World in Data. “Global fishing discards by type of fishing gear” [dataset]. Pérez Roda, M.A. et al. (2019).  A third assessment of global marine fisheries discards. FAO Fisheries and Aquaculture. [original data]. Retrieved May 12, 2026 from https://archive.ourworldindata.org/20260512-095313/grapher/fish-discards-gear.html (archived on May 12, 2026).

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