Northland Rescue Helicopter pilot Lance Donnelly speaks about the Enchanter fishing boat rescue operation. Video / Northland Rescue Helicopter / Michael Cunningham
Camera installation on up to 300 commercial fishing vessels will commence in August.
The rollout, costing $68 million over four years, aimed at providing independent, accurate information about fishing activity and better evidence for decision-making, according to Oceans and Fisheries minister David Parker.
Trawl and set net vessels operating off the West Coast of the North Island would receive the first cameras from August.
Those vessels were expected to be transmitting footage to Fisheries New Zealand from November 30.
"It will be supported by cutting-edge artificial intelligence software that will help put New Zealand at the forefront of camera monitoring technology," Parker said.
"Consumer decisions are increasingly driven by environmental factors, and this is another step towards providing assurance about New Zealand's premium and sustainably sourced seafood products."
The software used machine learning to recognise relevant activity for recording.
When it detected activities such as net setting or hauling, the cameras would move into high-definition capture and the relevant footage would stored and marked for upload.
It was designed to reduce footage storage and review costs, and better protect the privacy of fishers.
It followed the 2019 rollout of cameras on vessels operating in the core Māui dolphin habitat.
Minister of Oceans and Fisheries David Parker. Photo / Mark Mitchell
The Spark Business Group, that included a number of Kiwi tech companies, had been appointed as the prime supplier to manage the rollout, training and support for the installation of onboard cameras.
Of the $68m bill, about $10m would be recovered from the industry and would be aligned with standard fisheries cost recovery provisions from the 2025/26 fishing year.
Vessels posing the greatest risk to at-risk protected species - such as Hector's and Māui dolphins and hoiho - would be prioritised.
The rollout included:
• Set net vessels (8m or larger), surface longline, and bottom longline vessels
• Trawlers of 32m or less, except those targeting scampi, and Danish and purse seine vessels.
Parker said there were between 1500 and 2000 vessels equipped with the cameras.
"Once the rollout is complete, it will increase the global total of vessels with cameras by about 15 per cent."
