TAE (Total Allowable Effort)

A total allowable effort (TAE) is the fishery-wide cap on fishing effort, the input-control counterpart to a total allowable catch. Instead of limiting tonnage landed, it limits the effort that may be applied, expressed as total days at sea, vessel-days, gear units, or aggregate engine power, then divided into individual effort allocations. A TAE suits mixed and data-poor fisheries where weighing every species for a catch quota is impractical. Its weakness is effort creep: as gear, electronics, and engines improve, the real fishing power behind each nominal effort unit rises and the cap loosens.