Boris Worm’s and Ray Hilborn’s recently published study on the outlook for global fisheries painted a hopeful outlook. Sustaining global fisheries is within reach. We have the tools that have generally proven effective. We just need to use them.
Not that it’s easy. There’s nothing easy about fishermen having to find another way to earn a living so a stock can rebuild. And it’s hard work for restaurants and retailers to write and follow a sustainable seafood purchasing policy.
But buyers who’ve tackled that worthwhile endeavor can take some pride in the fact that their work is beginning to have some impact in rebuilding fisheries, said Ray Hilborn, a professor in the School of Aquatic and Fishery Sciences at the University of Washington.
“One needs to be very careful about where the fish comes from,” said Hilborn. “Some places are doing well and should be rewarded. Other places have not made that transformation.”
Hilborn and Worm, a biologist at Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia, along with 19 other authors, co-authored “Rebuilding Global Fisheries,” published in the 31 July issue of Science magazine.
For seafood buyers, said Hilborn, the biggest takeaway point is that “many fish stocks are now well managed and there is a wide range of seafood that can be consumed without worrying about sustainability.”
The scientists looked at the status of 166 stocks worldwide in 10 large marine ecosystems and found that steps to curb overfishing are beginning to succeed. While there is still much work to be done, the study found there are management approaches that have worked to address overfishing and rebuild stocks.
The stocks and ecosystems they studied are less than one-quarter of global stocks and catch. Half of those are either lightly or moderately fished or rebuilding, while 63 percent need to be rebuilt.
The scientists named certifications as a tool for rebuilding fisheries, along with management tools like gear restrictions, closed areas, reductions in fishing capacity, total allowable catches and catch shares. In catch-share systems, fishermen or companies own a share of an overall science-based quota. When the quota is reached, fishing stops. Shares become more valuable as a fishery rebuilds.
“The certification of sustainable fisheries is increasingly used as an incentive for improved management practices,” wrote Worm and Hilborn. “Realigning economic incentives with resource conservation (rather than overexploitation) is increasingly recognized as a critical component of successful rebuilding efforts.”
Fishery managers should consider a rate of fishing that leads to maximum sustainable yield as an upper limit, rather than a target, they recommended.
The National Science Foundation (NSF), which supported the two-year study, called the work “groundbreaking” because it was a landmark effort to resolve what seemed like contradictory conclusions based on the same data, said Henry Gholz, program director for the NSF’s National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis in Santa Barbara, Calif.
The study represents a rare consensus between fisheries scientists and conservation ecologists, who both view overfishing as a serious problem but have disagreed on how bad the situation is, wrote Lizzie Buchen, in the 30 July edition of the journal Nature. In 2006, Worm suggested all fisheries could collapse by 2048, while Hilborn publicly disagreed and argued the situation was not as bleak and pointed out success stories. Hilborn and Worm in discussions realized a shared sense of purpose, says the NSF, and assembled fisheries scientists and ecologists for a series of working groups over two years.
A variety of management tools are working, concluded the study. Any seafood buyers who used bleak predictions about the state of global fisheries as a reason to throw their hands up would be wise to think again. Sustainable fisheries are within reach.
