Vessel Viewer

A policy tool insuring against Illegal, Unreported and Unregulated (IUU) fishing

Project Lead: ORRAA
Supporting Partners: Global Fishing Watch, TMT, and Oceana
Financial Support: Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation and the UK’s Blue Planet Fund
Location: Global
Project Timeline: Ongoing (2022-2026)

Summary 

ORRAA, along with our partners Global Fishing Watch and TMT, have developed an innovative new technology tool for insurers to help combat IUU fishing: Vessel Viewer.  

Vessel Viewer is a data and insights tool that offers critical information on vessel identity, activities, and authorisations. It compiles multiple data sources and links it to insights that highlight the potential that a vessel may be engaging in or supporting IUU fishing. By arming underwriters with this important information, they can more effectively evaluate their potential exposure risk and enable them to flag any concerns or gaps to investigate further before proceeding with insurance coverage.  

By cutting off access to insurance, the sector can play a key role in creating a strong financial disincentive against IUU fishing, while also protecting themselves from exposure to legal liability and reputational harm. A win-win for insurers and the Ocean.   

Challenge 

IUU fishing undercuts effective fisheries management and harms Ocean ecosystems. It is estimated that IUU fishing costs the global economy over USD$20 billion annually, leading to some fish stocks being on the verge of collapse. IUU fishing has become pervasive by taking advantage of the lack of transparency in the fishing industry, using gaps in regulations and patchy monitoring at sea and in port, to operate undetected. With 12% of the world’s population relying on fisheries for their livelihoods, IUU fishing threatens the economic security of millions of small-scale fishers and their communities, as well as legitimate fishers. In addition, IUU fishing is closely associated with labour and human rights abuses. 

Solution

Removing access to insurance is one lever that has significant potential to deter IUU fishing globally. Vessel Viewer, a vessel history and insights tool developed by Global Fishing Watch and TMT, helps insurers evaluate the current and past behaviours and characteristics of vessels to estimate their likelihood of engaging in or supporting IUU fishing.  This tool will help insurers fill information gaps on the vessels they insure and will create a positive cycle of information-sharing, with the aim to deliver increased data transparency and improved risk assessment.  

The initiative has also developed in collaboration with environmental non-profit, Oceana, which has led parallel work to secure approval of new insurance policy wording with the Lloyd’s Market Association (LMA) that enables insurers to cut off policy coverage to a vessel, its owners or managers, if they are added to an official government IUU fishing blacklist. 

Scalability and Next Steps

A beta-version of Vessel Viewer has been pilot tested with 16 insurance and reinsurance companies taking part to help co-develop the tool with industry insight. Feedback from insurers has been incorporated into Vessel Viewer , with its public launch in October 2023. 

Further improvements and additional features such as new vessel insights, automated vessel group (portfolio) review and dynamic reporting were released in November 2024. The development of these features is also being informed by feedback received during the pilots with insurers.

Vessel Viewer is now available for commercial use by insurers. Vessel Viewer’s Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) are also now available for integration directly into insurers’ internal data tools. 

If you are interested in using Vessel Viewer, please contact: paul.whitaker@globalfishingwatch.org