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This document provides an update of the statistics of the Spanish purse seine fleet fishing in the Indian Ocean for the period 1990 to 2017. Data include catch and effort statistics, as well as some fishery indicators by species and fishing mode. Information about the scheme and coverage of the sampling, together with maps and diagrams illustrating the spatio-temporal fishing patterns of this fleet are also provided. A total of 14 Spanish purse seiners operated in the IOTC area during 2017. Purse seiners’ carrying capacity for most of the vessels is higher than 1,200 t. The total estimated catches for the main target species in 2017 were: 54513 t of yellowfin (YFT), 84432 t of skipjack (SKJ), 12345 t of bigeye (BET) and 100 t of albacore (ALB). The total catch in 2017 was 151424 t (including other species), 11 % higher than last year and 12% higher than the average previous 5 years, mainly due to the increase in skipjack catch. Although skipjack has been the main component of the catch in the previous five years (2012-2016), skipjack catches increased by 37% during 2017 in relation to this period. During 2017, YFT catches were 5% lower than the previous five years average (2012-2016). Effort, measured in searching days, has changed in relation to the average of the last five years, thus during 2017 there were 2618 fishing days vs. 3274.2 searching days in average for the period 2012-2016. This significant reduction was probably due to the closing of fishing activity on 5th November of 2017 up to the end of the year. During 2017, the length of 73606 tropical tuna fishes from the Spanish fleet was collected, not only from landing at port but also by scientific observers from discards on board: 8409 bigeye, 20207 skipjack, and 44990 yellowfin.
