Subsidies to high seas bottom trawl fleets and the sustainability of deep-sea demersal fish stocks

The life spans of demersal species of fishes occurring in deep-waters are much longer and their potential growth rates much lower than those of related shallow water species. As a result, deep-sea demersal fish species are more vulnerable to exploitation. This is because low growth rates relative to the available market discount rate for capital makes it desirable for fishing firms to mine, rather than sustainably exploit, these resources even in the absence of fisheries subsidies. However, it is common knowledge that governments around the world do provide subsidies to their fishing industries. The objective of this contribution is to estimate the global amount of subsidies paid to bottom trawl fleets operating in the high seas, i.e., outside of the Exclusive Economic Zones of maritime countries. Our study suggests that fisheries subsidies to these fleets stand at about US$152 million per year, which constitutes 25% of the total landed value of the fleet. Economic data for bottom trawlers suggest that the profit achieved by this vessel group is normally not more than 10% of landed value. The implication of this finding is that without subsidies, the bulk of the world's bottom trawl fleet operating in the high seas will be operating at a loss, and unable to fish, thereby reducing the current threat to deep-sea and high seas fish stocks.     

Further action on bycatch could boost United States fisheries performance

This paper examines the sustainability of United States fisheries managed under the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act, the law that provides the framework for federal fisheries management. Sustainability across a broad suite of criteria, including health of the fished stock, bycatch, and effects on the habitat and ecosystem, was measured against the Monterey Bay Aquarium׳s Seafood Watch criteria for ecological sustainability. Seafood Watch ratings and numerical scores for U.S. federally managed fisheries were analyzed to elucidate strengths and weaknesses among federally-managed fisheries. Of U.S. federally managed fisheries assessed by Seafood Watch, only 2% are rated “Avoid”, and strong ratings for stock health for nearly all fisheries indicate that the Magnuson-Stevens Act is fundamentally succeeding at maintaining or rebuilding the abundance of targeted stocks. The majority (79%) of U.S. fisheries earn the intermediate rating of “Good Alternative”, and 19% earn the top rating of “Best Choice”. Given that U.S. fisheries management is considered among the strongest in the world, this analysis assesses why the majority of U.S. fisheries are not rated “Best Choice”. Fisheries for all variety of species, and using a wide range of fishing methods, can merit “Best Choice” status. However, the majority of U.S. fisheries do not achieve this rating due primarily to bycatch concerns. By improving performance with regard to bycatch, most “Good Alternative” U.S. federal fisheries could reach “Best Choice” status and reap rewards in the marketplace for that recognition. Findings suggest that current science-based management should be maintained in the Magnuson-Stevens Act reauthorization, managers should adopt best practices based on fisheries that are already performing well in the U.S., and more specific federal bycatch mitigation requirements should be implemented.     

Benchmarking for fisheries governance

The paper develops a benchmarking framework to improve fisheries governance and promote resilient ecosystems and profitable fisheries. The benchmarking includes five key components: accountability, transparency, incentives, risk assessment and management; and adaptability. Collectively, these factors provide a framework to benchmark and improve fisheries governance. Initial findings from benchmarking in two of Australia's Commonwealth fisheries indicate that the framework provides an important tool to help overcome the underlying causes of unsustainability in capture fisheries—poor and/or ineffective fisheries governance.     

Systems engineering principles in fisheries management

Fisheries management receives valuable, but often fragmented information from academic disciplines such as biology, economics, and social sciences. A multi-disciplinary perspective seems to be necessary if the fisheries are to become sustainable. Globally, overcapacity is considered as the most serious threat to sustainable fisheries, which indicates the need for a stronger integration of technological aspects into fisheries management. This paper discusses application of systems engineering principles and integration of technology into fisheries management. The systems engineering process facilitates implementation of multi-disciplinary information from researchers to fisheries managers in the decision-making towards sustainable fisheries, but may also be used to overcome multi-disciplinary obstacles among scientists. The article concludes that use of systems engineering principles may become a valuable contribution to fisheries management because of increased transparency and reduced risk associated with the decision-making process.     

An overview of cold-water coral protection on the high seas: The Hatton bank (NE Atlantic)—A case study

The present paper provides an overview of cold-water corals protection in the Hatton Bank deep-water fisheries through the implementation of the United Nations General Assembly resolution 61/105. The methodology and scientific evidence used to propose protection of cold-water coral ecosystems in the high seas (∼16,000 km²) are briefly summarised. The role of international agents and importance of interdisciplinary research for making management decisions are furthermore described. Implementation was slow because (i) of scarce initial scientific knowledge, (ii) research on the high seas was difficult and expensive, (iii) there were several international interests at stake, (iv) agreement from a number of agents was needed, and (v) international advisory and decision making processes were quite slow. Some lessons learned are also discussed since these may help to increase protection efficiency of deep-sea vulnerable marine ecosystems in the high seas.     

The Common Fisheries Policy of the European Union and fisheries economics

The revision of the Common Fisheries Policy of the European Union in 2003 was communicated in a ‘Roadmap’, including the opinion of the EU Commission on how to reform the fisheries policy. This paper reviews the Roadmap and confronts the opinion and initiatives proposed by the Commission with the ‘conventional’ bioeconomic theory. The purpose is to assess to what extent the lessons of the theory could be found in the Roadmap. Having in mind the complexity of the EU fisheries, the Roadmap, in particular, focuses on fleet management policy with the aim of reducing overcapacity on a community level. This applies as a supplementary means to the conventional fish stock conservation measures. In conclusion, the EU Commission is aware of the lessons learned from the bioeconomic theory.     

Small-scale marine fisheries policy in Vietnam

Vietnam's marine fisheries are considered to be small scale and are concentrated in coastal near-shore waters. This has resulted in heavy pressure on near-shore fisheries resources. Near-shore fisheries are considered by fishers and the government to be over-exploited, causing hardship for many coastal communities. This paper reviews and analyzes changes in policy towards small-scale fisheries in Vietnam over the last two decades. The primary issues facing the small-scale fisheries in Vietnam are to restructure the near-shore fisheries and to address over-capacity. Recommended actions include improved fisheries statistics, resources for provincial fisheries staff, and a coordinated and integrated approach involving a mixed strategy of resource management; resource restoration; economic and community development; and new governance arrangements.     

Not all fisheries will be collapsed in 2048

In a recently published paper, Worm et al. [Impacts of biodiversity loss on ocean ecosystem services. Science 2006;314:787–90.] project “the global collapse of all taxa currently fished” by 2048. Using their criteria and data, this paper shows that the number of not-collapsed fisheries actually increased over time to a plateau of about 5600 in 1985–2003. Furthermore, if trends are projected into the future, more than half of the world's fisheries would always be in a recovered state.     

Korea's fisheries industry and government financial transfers

The Korean fisheries industry has long played a role as a national food industry with agriculture. Fisheries products supply about 39.2% of animal proteins that Korean people need. The industry, however, is facing great challenges including international arguments for reduction or abolition of fishery subsidies. Therefore, it is urgent for us to review the characteristics of fishery subsidies according to WTO, OECD, FAO and UNEP. This paper examines the status of Korean fishery industry, and to tackle the problems of the currently supported fishery policy funds, whose total amount in 1999 was more than 1 trillion Korean won with 77 fishery projects.     

Determining the degree of 'small-scaleness' using fisheries in British Columbia as an example

Small-scale fisheries have been estimated to contribute up to 30% of the global landed value, which is caught by approximately 22 million fishers, some of which can be attributed to developed countries. Socio-economic analysis of small-scale fisheries often focuses on developing countries and fails to recognize the presence and contribution of small-scale fisheries in the developed world. Fisheries in British Columbia are diverse and often regarded as being industrialized and large-scale when analyzed in a global context. This study aims to demonstrate that features of small-scale fisheries are present within British Columbia's fleets. A list of re-occurring features of small-scale fisheries is curated from the literature to capture physical, economic and social features of small-scale fisheries. These commonly identified features of small-scale fisheries are applied to Aboriginal Food, Social and Ceremonial fisheries and all commercial fisheries in British Columbia are analyzed to determine the presence or absence of each small-scale fishery feature. The results of this research create a gradient of fisheries from smallest to largest scale. This approach determines that Aboriginal Food, Social and Ceremonial fisheries are the most small-scale, while the sablefish fishery is the largest scale. The qualitative nature of this framework creates an opportunity for any group of fisheries in the world to be compared.     

Global fisheries losses at the exclusive economic zone level, 1950 to present

Up to one-third of commercial fishery stocks may be overfished at present. By analyzing catch trends and applying an empirical relationship derived from stock assessments, this article tracks the geographic spread of overfishing at the country level in terms of lost catch and lost revenue, from the start of industrialized fishing in 1950-2004. The results tell a cautionary tale of serial depletion to meet the ever-rising demand for fish. Examining country losses with respect to fishery management reveals that overcapacity and excess fishing effort are widespread, but also that recent trends towards sustainability can stabilize or reverse losses (e.g. for Norway, Iceland, the US, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand). Global trade effectively masks the successive depletion of stocks, so that without decisive action to reduce fishing effort, many more stocks will suffer and undernourishment impacts for the major exporting, food-deficit nations will only magnify.     

Governing fisheries as complex adaptive systems

Fisheries are complex human-in-nature systems. The conventional approach to fisheries systems has been to treat them as predictable and controllable. As complex systems they are neither of the two and have to be approached differently. Complex systems often exhibit the capacity to self-organize or adapt, even without outside influence. If this is true of fisheries, it should lead to a radically different approach to management of fisheries systems that places much emphasis on enabling self-organization, learning and adaptation. Conceptual and practical frameworks for enabling activities are needed.     

Objectives of fisheries management: case studies from the UK, France, Spain and Denmark

The main objectives of fisheries management are generally similar throughout the world. These are often stated in policy documents such as the Common Fisheries Policy and the Magnuson–Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act. However, at the local level often the key objectives of management are more detailed, characterised by both the overriding management structure and the status and type of fishery concerned. In this paper, we consider case study fisheries from the UK, France, Spain and Denmark to compare some of the various types of fisheries and fisheries management systems that exist in the European Union. From this, we define the key objectives for each management system.     

Measuring management success: Experience with United States fisheries

Many articles have been published in recent years criticizing the management of living marine resources based solely on biological stock conservation criteria. In the United States and in many parts of the rest of the world, multiple management objectives and goals in addition to stock conservation must be met by fishery managers responsible for the marine resources under their control. An alternative management metric, conservation efficiency, is recommended based instead on a multi-disciplinary scientific framework that captures these different goals and the behavior of participants in the fishery. On the basis of the constraints facing managers, resources can be conserved and the quality of life of consumptive and nonconsumptive fishery participants improved.     

Is there any hope for fisheries management?

Fisheries is not the only discipline where models have been used in attempts to fine tune an aspect of the economy. Such fine-tuning can prove ineffective because of the uncertainties in the scientific underpinnings of the models and because of the omission of critical elements. In fisheries, the biological goal is to set allowable catches so that the harvest is not so large that it endangers the future health of the fish stock while it is not so low as to waste food, while the economic goal is to maximize the net economic rent generated by the fishery. It has long been recognized that the science underlying the setting of the total allowable catch is often too uncertain to justify such fine tuning, and that attempts to achieve that delicate balance has helped lead to crises in fisheries. One solution is to abandon such marginalism in favor of seriously reducing current catches.     

Benchmarking the first decade of post-apartheid fisheries reform in South Africa

The paper uses the three legislative criteria of resource sustainability, economic stability and social equity to measure the past decade of fisheries reform in South Africa. All three components of the reform process have been successful, although this judgement is subject to a number of important qualifications. First, the data available to measure success are limited. Second, both sustainability and stability are vulnerable to volatile factors external to the reform process (particularly variability in recruitment, climate change and exchange rate fluctuations) capable of derailing the process. Substantial alteration of the fishing industry by internal transformation of existing companies and the reallocation of access rights to new black entrants has led to a composition that closely reflects that of society as a whole and therefore meets the goal of equity. In the process, however, bona fide traditional fishers with a historical dependence on fishing have largely been denied legitimate access to the fisheries, and meeting their aspirations remains a challenge.     

Governance structures and sustainability in Indian Ocean sea cucumber fisheries

Good governance is paramount to the sustainability of fisheries, and inclusiveness of stakeholder groups has become the centerpiece in the ethos of managing small-scale fisheries. Understanding the effect of governance network structures on fishery sustainability can help guide governance to achieve desired outcomes. Data on resource users, fishing methods, governance networks and classifications of stock health were compiled for 17 sea cucumber fisheries in the Indian Ocean. The subjective influence of the actors and the complexity of governance networks on the health of wild stocks were analyzed. The fisheries differed widely in their resource users, fishing methods and governance networks. Little correspondence was found between the number of nodes in the governance networks and the health (exploitation status) of wild stocks. Government entities dominated the networks but neither their relative influence in the networks nor their proportionate contribution to the number of entities in the networks greatly affected stock health. These findings do not refute the benefits of inclusive governance, but rather suggest that multiple other factors (e.g. inadequate regulations, weak enforcement, high number of fishers) are also likely to play a role in influencing sea cucumber fishery sustainability. These factors must be tackled in tandem with good governance.     

How subsidies affect the economic viability of small-scale fisheries

This article presents the first bottom-up analysis of the proportion of global marine fisheries subsidies to small-scale fisheries (SSF). Using existing data, the reported national subsidy amounts are split into the fraction that goes to small- and large-scale fishing sectors. Results reveal a major imbalance in subsidy distribution, with SSF receiving only about 16% of the total global fisheries subsidy amount of $35 billion in 2009. To bring this into perspective, a person engaged in large-scale fishing received around 4 times the amount of subsidies received by their SSF counterparts. Furthermore, almost 90% of capacity-enhancing subsidies, which are known to exacerbate overfishing go to large-scale fisheries, thus increasing the unfair competitive advantage that large-scale fisheries already have. The developmental, economic and social consequences of this inequity are huge and impair the economic viability of the already vulnerable small-scale fishing sector. Conclusions indicate that taxpayers' money should be used to support sustainable fishing practices and in turn ocean conservation, and not to foster the degradation of marine ecosystems, often a result of capacity-enhancing subsidies. Reducing capacity-enhancing subsidies will have minimal negative effects on SSF communities since they receive very little of these subsidies to begin with. Instead, it will help correct the existing inequality, enhance SSF economic viability, and promote global fisheries sustainability.     

The incorporation of traditional knowledge into Alaska federal fisheries management

Fisheries policy and management processes for federal waters off western Alaska currently lack consistent and considered integration of traditional knowledge (TK), TK holders, social science of TK, and subsistence information. The incorporation of these into fisheries work can lead to more informed, equitable and effective policy and management practices. This paper includes information and recommendations derived from previous work by the authors as well as from two community workshops with indigenous TK holders and fisheries experts. Discussions of TK and related concepts, TK research in the Bering Strait and Yukon River regions, and Alaska federal fisheries management-related institutions and processes as pertains to TK are presented. Substantive recommendations are provided for improving processes, increasing tribal representation, capacity building, effective communication, outreach and relationship-building, the incorporation of indigenous concerns and values, and regarding the development of a Fisheries Ecosystem Plan for the Bering Sea.