The tech you didn’t know we needed

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This week we’re quoting…

Matthew Savoca (Marine Biologist, originally quoted in Knowable Magazine) 

What Savoca said: 

“There are not very many conservation issues that I’m aware of where industry and conservationists and consumers and the fishermen and the resource users all want the same thing.” 

We’re talking about fishing 

We’ve set ourselves a challenge this week – to make fishing nets interesting to people who aren’t interested in fishing. 

But it’s going to be easier than we thought. In his interview with Knowable Magazine, Savoca pointed out that everyone wants less bycatch (marine species caught by accident in fishing nets) – and that everyone includes the tech industry. 

It sounds like a low-fi problem. Fishing nets catch things they’re not supposed to; turtles, sharks, seabirds, juvenile fish. But it’s a problem that has long created limits for fisheries around the world. It reduces efficiency and damages ecosystems, and introduces friction between sustainability goals and commercial reality.

A move from passive nets to selective systems 

Fishing equipment has traditionally been designed for reach and volume. Nets, lines, and trawls prioritise efficiency, with limited ability to distinguish between species.

In the Knowable Magazine article, we learn about a new generation of tools enabling selectivity at the point of capture.

Examples include: 

• LED-lit nets that influence how species interact with gear, reducing turtle bycatch in certain fisheries
• Modified hooks and lines designed to reduce unintended capture
• Escape panels and excluder devices that allow specific species to exit

Across a number of trials, these approaches have delivered measurable reductions in bycatch while maintaining commercially viable catch levels. That balance (ecological benefit alongside operational viability) decides whether these tools move beyond trials and into widespread use.

OK, but why are we telling you about this? 

Stick with us here. At first glance, this looks like incremental innovation. But in practice, it has the potential to reshape three larger systems: 

1. Food security
   Fisheries provide a primary source of protein for billions of people. Bycatch reduces the efficiency of that system – economically and biologically. More selective gear supports higher quality harvests, reduced waste, and healthier fish stocks over time. In regions where food systems are under pressure, these gains accumulate quickly.
2. Climate and ecosystem resilience
   Marine ecosystems operate as interconnected systems. The removal of non-target species (particularly long-lived species such as turtles) affects biodiversity and alters ecosystem balance. Bycatch contributes to this pressure, which in turn influences the resilience of fisheries themselves. Reducing bycatch strengthens the underlying system that supports long-term productivity.
3. Regulation and compliance
   Fisheries operate within an increasingly structured regulatory environment, shaped by sustainability standards, certifications, and quotas. Selective gear introduces a different mechanism for compliance. Instead of relying primarily on monitoring and enforcement, regulators can support solutions embedded directly into equipment – tools that shape outcomes through design.

This approach tends to scale more smoothly, especially across fragmented global fisheries.

The real constraint is adoption 

So the tech is advancing, but the key variable is uptake. 

Fishing operates within tight margins, which makes practical performance central to adoption. New gear needs to:

• Sustain or improve catch yields
• Integrate with existing practices
• Justify upfront costs

The solutions outlined here do align with these requirements – they’re low-cost (relatively), they’re compatible with established workflows, and they’ve been validated through trials. 

That combination means these fairly simple innovations have real potential to be used at scale.

Do you recognise this pattern? 

You can find the same pattern across other areas of tech. Capability spreads, and the constraint shifts. 

In this case, ocean conditions are still complex and dynamic (and always will be). So the interface with those conditions (the gear) is becoming more adaptable. 

Fishing equipment is evolving into a set of tunable systems, where relatively small design adjustments produce meaningful changes in outcome.

Part of the climate tech opportunity 

We think this represents a specific category of climate opportunity – a systems-level improvement applied to an established global industry. 

It sits at the intersection of ocean tech, food systems, and sustainability infrastructure. And it aligns with regions investing in coastal development and marine stewardship, across the Middle East and worldwide. 

As coastal economies expand, the value of solutions that improve efficiency while protecting ecosystems becomes increasingly clear.

Earlier waves of ocean tech focused on expanding our reach into deeper waters and larger catches. This wave is centred on precision – not doing more, but doing better.

Have an idea for a topic you'd like us to cover? We're eager to hear it. Drop us a message and share your thoughts.

Catch you next week,
The LEAP Team