July 2004

Global Fish Stocks in Crisis

The sustainable development of future food sources should not cost the Earth.

Consistent over-fishing has damaged fish stocks, which are being harvested at over twice the recommended rate, say conservationalists.

To highlight this problem, the North East Atlantic Commission, which fixed fishing quotas for blue whiting in 1994 at 650,000 tonnes, says fisherman caught 2.3m tonnes last year.

WWF says that stocks of fish will stop being sustainable if current practices are continued. A spokesman for the conservation body said: “Destructive and unsustainable fishing represents the greatest threat to our ocean ecosystems.

“Deep sea ecosystems are particularly vulnerable because they are often made up of slow-growing species which cannot withstand commercial fishing pressure.”

Viable solutions to help preserve fish stocks and ocean ecosystems have been proposed in recent times.

At the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Andrew Balmford of Cambridge University, Callum Roberts of The University of York and colleagues claim that for less than £8bn a year, governments could protect dwindling global fish stocks in a series of marine nature reserves around the world.

This investment would be enough to protect 30% of the oceans from all fishing, creating over a million jobs and not only safeguard, but increase a global fish catch worth up to £44bn a year.

Professor Roberts said: “We have barely even begun the task of creating marine parks. Here in Britain, a paltry one fiftieth of one percent of our seas is encompassed by marine nature reserves and only one fiftieth of their combined area is closed to fishing. Yet the seas are being devastated by unsustainable fishing, pollution and mineral exploitation.”

The researchers point out that the oceans are in trouble; global fish catches are declining, populations of whales, dolphins and other marine mammals have decreased. Additionally, habitats such as estuaries, reefs and other submarine landscapes vital for breeding have been damaged or destroyed.

“Meeting this commitment to marine protection will require international effort on an unprecedented scale. Just half a percent of the sea lies in marine parks today, compared with 12% of the land,” said Dr Balmford.

The £8bn proposed annual spend equates to half the £16bn a year spent on economically and environmentally damaging subsidies to commercial fisheries.

Charles Clover puts forward a more ambitious plan – utilising satellite data to allow society to police fishing activity. He writes: “Europe would allow the citizens themselves to police these reserves and the fisheries of the world where European vessels fish by making the satellite monitoring data on all EU vessels available for all to see on the internet in real time…”

He says Europe’s fishing fleet must be cut by giving offshore fishermen individual transferable quotas, with a different system for inshore fishermen.

He also wants the EU to create reserves on the North Sea and the north Atlantic to let fish stocks recover.

“Open access to satellite data would be one of the conditions that went with the generous gift of fishing quota to fishermen by a benevolent public - who own the sea.”

Mr Clover claims that 75% of the world’s fish stocks are either fully exploited or over-fished, threatening millions of people with starvation.

However, he believes that there will be a lot of transitional pain when adopting this methodology: “What’s got to go, because it’s gone everywhere else in raw material industries the world over, is people.

“The bottom line is that there are just too many fishermen, and fishing technology gets better every year.”

One thing is clear – fishing at the current rate is unsustainable and will damage the environment, as well as drive some species to extinction. Protecting global fish stocks would guarantee the sustained delivery of ecosystem services to humanity valued at £385bn. Something needs to be done, and a combination of these suggestions could well be the answer. Sustainable development of future food sources can be expensive, but the measures will not cost the Earth.