A regional database management system - the fisheries resource information system and tools (FiRST): Its design, utility and future directions

South and Southeast Asian countries have undertaken demersal trawl surveys to measure the fisheries potential of their waters throughout the 20th century. However, ensuring full use of, and easy access to the resulting data is a challenge in developing countries. The Fisheries Resource Information System and Tools (FiRST) was developed through a regional collaborative effort across eight South and Southeast Asian counties to meet these needs. FIRST is a data management system for scientific trawl survey data and includes data summary and visualization tools, an analytical routine to estimate biomass, and data import/export modules. The FiRST software has also facilitated the establishment of a regional database, 'TrawlBase', which contains more than 20,000 hauls or stations from scientific trawl surveys in 10 countries conducted between 1926 and 1995. The regional database is an important regional resource for coastal fisheries management complementing national fisheries catch statistics. This article describes the refined version of FiRST (version 2004) and provides examples on how the database ('TrawlBase') has been used to date for analyses aimed at establishing historic resource baselines and examining the status of coastal fishery resources. The results show a severe decline of resource biomass to an average of 22% of pre-exploitation levels, with cases as low < 4%. These results clearly demonstrate the strong impact of fishing on coastal resource biomass and diversity. (c) 2006 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.