Cephalopod production from the waters around Taiwan

The landing of cephalopods of Taiwan has increased from around 15,000 t in 1968 to about 280,000 t in 1998. This increase is entirely due to the overseas operation of squid jigging fleet since 1982. The domestic landing of cephalopods during this period has fluctuated between some 4000 t and 25,000 t. The contribution of domestic landing to the total national cephalopod landing has decreased from a high of 46% to a low of 5%. Cuttlefish and loliginid squid represent about 87% of the domestic cephalopod landing, although figures fluctuated between 55% and 99% for the same period. The overall fishery statistics published by the Taiwan Fisheries Bureau over the period 1968 to 1998 were analyzed. Although a gap exists in the data set between 1977 and 1984, the LPUE of the total domestic groundfish fishery for the period showed a declining trend with the decline for 1985 to 1998 being faster than for the period between 1968 and 1976, indicating an acceleration of overfishing of finfish stock in recent years. The LPUE for the domestic cephalopod fisheries for 1968 to 1976 showed an increasing trend and a nearly stable trend for 1985 to 1998. The data suggest that following the overfishing of finfish stocks in the inshore and coastal waters of Taiwan, cephalopods replaced finfish, a situation that was previously reported for the Sahara Bank and the Gulf of Thailand regions.