The number of fish in the world’s oceans has been decimated by overfishing, and current fishery regulations setting limits on the amount that can be caught are not helping. According to a new report published Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the solution is cooperation by fishermen around the world, which scientists now say would leave plenty of fish to catch, while still doubling the number of fish left by the year 2050.
Scientists from the University of Washington, the University of California – Santa Barbara and the Environmental Defense Fund compiled a database that included over 4,500 worldwide fisheries, and, after using a number of bioeconomic models, found that productivity and health can coexist in the world’s fisheries. Environmental Defense Fund’s chief oceans scientist Douglas Radar, one of the study’s lead authors, said, “It is not a tradeoff between the needs of fishermen and the needs of fish.”
The study explains that sound management reforms to global fisheries “could generate annual increases exceeding 16 million metric tons (MMT) in catch, $53 billion in profit, and 619 MMT in biomass relative to business as usual. We also find that, with appropriate reforms, recovery can happen quickly, with the median fishery taking under 10 [years] to reach recovery targets.”
Sound too good to be true? Maybe not, if fishermen will only adopt sustainable fishing practices that include a “catch share” model of management of the world’s fisheries. In these systems, regulators figure out how many fish can be caught without hurting future fish populations. That amount is then divided into shares that are distributed to individual fishermen, giving each a set amount of fish they can catch in a year.
Ray Hilborn, marine biology and fishers science professor at the University of Washington, who is a co-author of the study, says “If you can reform fisheries and eliminate their competitive nature, there’s enormous room for profits, catch and abundance.
This approach is different than the quotas set in traditional fishing regulations for the number of fish that can be caught and limit the number of days a fleet can fish, as well as the equipment they can use. The study authors say this leads to a free-for-all in which individual fishermen try to grab the most they can before regulators declare that the quota has been met, ending the fishing season. This system causes overfishing and leads to unpredictability in the business.
Amanda Leland, Environmental Defense Fund’s senior vice president for oceans said, “When you give fishermen a secure share of the catch and they know on January 1 the total catch for the year, they slow down their fishing, they burn less fuel, they cut their costs, they go when the weather is good, and they are able to provide a much more predictable supply.”
However, there is little sign that Asia would be willing to adopt sustainable fishing. Just Wednesday, Singapore’s daily newspaper Today reported that Southeast Asian countries are angry about illegal fishing in their waters by Chinese trawlers. There are also skeptics, once the shares of available fish are given out it could result newcomers waiting years to enter the system.
Hilborn responded to this criticism, saying, “Limiting access to fishing is the primary tool we’ve had to improve fisheries. In very few fisheries can anyone go fishing who wants to go fishing.”