Saving Seafood

JOHN SACKTON: We Need a New Magnuson Act to Deal with Climate Change Impacts on Fisheries

June 14, 2019 — SEAFOOD NEWS — 50 years ago fisheries were in crisis.  The prevailing international law allowed no national control of ocean activities beyond 12 miles.  In New England, this meant giant Soviet factory trawlers practicing pulse fishing came in to devastate the abundant haddock stock, leaving US fishermen crumbs after they left.

Similar fishing situations were occurring around other coastal nations.  Chile and Peru were the first countries to declare a 200-mile exclusive economic zone.  Other countries such as the US and Iceland followed and by 1982, the UN recognized the right of countries to establish a 200-mile exclusive economic zone.

The implementing legislation in the US was the Magnuson-Stevens Act. Passed in 1976, the act not only restricted foreign fishing but much to the surprise of East Coast fishermen, it also implemented a system of fisheries management to set quotas and control overfishing.

The key features of Magnuson were to establish regional councils so as to promote local control over fisheries, to require management decisions be based on the best available science, and to involve all stakeholders in the council and decision-making process.

The results have been a fisheries management system that has preserved healthy stocks, as in Alaska, rebuilt overfished stocks (on the West Coast), and became the model for global sustainable fisheries management.  It is fair to say that the prosperity we see in the US seafood industry today would not exist without Magnuson.

But we are facing a new crisis every bit as profound as the lack of EEZ’s in the 1970s.  That is the crisis of global warming and ocean acidification, caused by the use of fossil fuels that have built up CO2in the atmosphere to dangerous levels.

CO2 induced warming is leading to movement of fish to different areas, increased acidification that is interfering with the use of calcium for shells, including for zooplankton, changes in ocean currents, loss of sea ice, and sea level rise that is reducing the area of coastal marshes.  Taken together, these changes challenge the very basis of our fisheries management system, which depends on predicting the changes in stocks in a stable environment.

Several recent reports have provided eye-opening data.  One is an excellent report produced by the Canadian DFO on the state of the North Atlantic Ocean.  Finally, the DFO is spending money on transparent science and providing a real public service by documenting in one place all aspects of the North Atlantic ecosystem.

The most significant factors in the report are the change in the quality of zooplankton due to mistiming of plankton blooms.   This impacts the entire marine food chain.  A second is the movement of fish to new habitats, exemplified by the lobster fishery which is currently booming off of Nova Scotia, but which is likely to crash as waters exceed a certain summer temperature.  We published a summary of this report this week.

Another recent report, issued in May,  was the UN report on the loss of biodiversity.  This report from the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES), was approved and adopted by the UN, and says that around 1 million animal and plant species are now threatened with extinction, many within decades, more than ever before in human history.

Sir Robert Watson, chair of the panel, said   “The overwhelming evidence of the IPBES Global Assessment, from a wide range of different fields of knowledge, presents an ominous picture.  The health of ecosystems on which we and all other species depend is deteriorating more rapidly than ever. We are eroding the very foundations of our economies, livelihoods, food security, health and quality of life worldwide.”

The seafood industry is complex because it is so varied, and regional differences abound.  This is partly why those of us in the industry love it so much. There is just nothing comparable to the interplay of natural productivity, human knowledge and skill, and highly diverse conditions and ecosystems.  Seafood distributors routinely carry over 100 items, even though most sales are from a smaller cluster of major species.

The commercial experience of the oyster farmer, a lobster fisherman in Nova Scotia, a salmon grower, a pollock captain in the Bering Sea, or a Dungeness fisherman out of Newport, Oregon are totally different, with each adapted to their particular resource and environment.

This complexity and localization make it very hard for people in particular fisheries to see the big picture.  Local communities can get dependent on a fishery that appears to be stable, and then have that stability pulled out from under them in an instant.

The common denominator for a new “Magnuson Act” should be the economic vitality and resilience of coastal communities.  This may not always come from fishing.

Wind power, tourism, marine protected areas, as well as fishing all can serve as an economic foundation as communities adapt to climate change and sea level rise.  Today proponents of most of these are in their own silos, in a war of all against all.

So fishermen oppose wind power developments, even though reducing fossil fuel emissions is the only possible path to prevent catastrophic increases in ocean temperatures. The temperature rise upends the productivity of most of the species on which they fish.

Fishermen also, by and large, oppose a massive increase in marine protected areas.  Yet a rethinking of habitat protection may be the only approach that would avoid a catastrophic loss of biodiversity.    We thrive on complex ocean ecosystems that offer changing opportunities.  If the price of maintaining that complexity means changing the way some ocean areas used for fishing, that is a price well worth paying.

Tourism is a bit more compatible with traditional fisheries.  In Astoria, Oregon, the Bornstein’s built their seafood processing plant in a way they could accommodate cruise ship visitors.  In our story about Nova Scotia lobstering, Lucien LeBlanc says he outfitted his new 50-foot lobster boat, the John Harold, to double as a tourist vessel and rely less on the fishery.  “Financially, I treat [every year]  like it’s my last year,” he says.

New Bedford, which on the one hand is the center of scallopers opposition to offshore wind power in New England, is, on the other hand, experiencing a dock and marine construction boom as the hub of offshore wind power.

The point is that these activities: fishing, power generation, tourism, and protecting biodiversity do not need to be in conflict with each other but could all contribute to the economic vitality needed to keep coastal communities intact.

This is where a new “Magnuson” type vision is needed.  We need a way to put forward an overarching vision of how to protect coastal communities in an era of climate crisis, not by watching individual ocean industries get destroyed but by developing a framework where they can all thrive together.

This not a Pollyanna puff piece about everyone working together.  The fact is that all these industries need support.  The fishing industry has benefitted massively from having the Magnuson Act as the foundation on which to build.  A new framework that focused on making coastal communities economically resilient around all ocean uses is not a zero-sum game.

By broadening our idea of what is necessary to keep fishing healthy for another 50 years, and by focusing on what will keep fishing communities healthy, we may find we get more support and better results if we look at the total picture of what we are facing, rather than just fighting over which 10 sq. mile grid to assign to wind, fishing, or protected areas.

This story was originally published on SeafoodNews.com, a subscription site. It is reprinted with permission.

FAO launches anti-IUU campaign on Chinese social media

June 10, 2019 — The United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) is reaching out directly to the Chinese public in a bid to turn opinion against illegal fishing.

The FAO recently launched a social media campaign on Chinese social media in Mandarin, aimed at popular platforms including microblogging site Weibo. The campaign calls for locals to “fight against illegal, unreported, and unregulated fishing” and also calls for the protection of fisheries to guarantee food security around the world.

The campaign is a new effort to inform the Chinese public of the impact of illegal fishing on the high seas – some of it conducted by Chinese vessels. The FAO’s campaign is an interesting contrast with state media, which tends to portray the development of China’s distant-water fleet as a strategic national priority.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

Ocean biodiversity in peril due to overfishing and climate change

May 31, 2019 — The biodiversity of the world’s oceans is declining in a manner unlike any time in human history.

A recent report from the United Nations paints a dire picture for wildlife around the globe, in both land-based and marine environments. About two-thirds of the marine environment has been significantly altered by human actions and climate change has the potential to make the situation much worse, the report said.

The report, from the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity Ecosystem Services (IPBES), was written by nearly 150 expert authors from 50 countries who assessed global changes over the last five decades. Only the initial summary of the report has been released; the full report is expected to exceed 1,500 pages and will be released later this year.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

Tuna Experts Mark 10 Years of Collaboration, Come Together for Workshop on Mitigation of Environmental Impacts of Tropical Tuna Purse Seine Fisheries

May 9, 2019 — The following was released by the International Seafood Sustainability Foundation & Common Oceans ABNJ Tuna Project: 

The International Seafood Sustainability Foundation (ISSF) and the Common Oceans ABNJ Tuna Project co-sponsored the Mitigating Environmental Impacts of Tropical Tuna Purse Seine Fisheries workshop, held at the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations’ (FAO) Headquarters in Rome, on 12-13 March 2019. The workshop reviewed the progress cross-sector research and advocacy efforts have made in reducing bycatch and other environmental impacts and also identified main focus areas for future activities.

Workshop sessions focused on: (1) bycatch of the tuna purse seine fishery; (2) sharks and rays; (3) small bigeye and yellowfin tuna; (4) fish aggregating device (FAD) structure impacts; (5) FAD management; and (6) looking ahead: the next 10 years. Each session comprised an expert presentation followed by a discussion panel including representatives from across the multi-sector workshop participants. The newly released report detailing the six sessions is now available for download. The report also offers data-rich presentations for each session.

Read the full release here

UN report: Humans accelerating extinction of other species

May 7, 2019 — People are putting nature in more trouble now than at any other time in human history, with extinction looming over 1 million species of plants and animals, scientists said Monday.

But it’s not too late to fix the problem, according to the United Nations’ first comprehensive report on biodiversity.

“We have reconfigured dramatically life on the planet,” report co-chairman Eduardo Brondizio of Indiana University said at a press conference.

Species loss is accelerating to a rate tens or hundreds of times faster than in the past, the report said. More than half a million species on land “have insufficient habitat for long-term survival” and are likely to go extinct, many within decades, unless their habitats are restored. The oceans are not any better off.

“Humanity unwittingly is attempting to throttle the living planet and humanity’s own future,” said George Mason University biologist Thomas Lovejoy, who has been called the godfather of biodiversity for his research. He was not part of the report.

“The biological diversity of this planet has been really hammered, and this is really our last chance to address all of that,” Lovejoy said.

Conservation scientists convened in Paris to issue the report, which exceeded 1,000 pages. The Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) included more than 450 researchers who used 15,000 scientific and government reports. The report’s summary had to be approved by representatives of all 109 nations.

Read the full story at the Associated Press

Rising incomes, increased urbanization to underpin seafood consumption growth

May 3, 2019 — The considerable growth in both fisheries and aquaculture production, matched by a rising public awareness of the important role that fish as a food group plays in healthy and diversified diets has driven seafood consumption upwards over the past five decades. Other factors contributing to the steady rise in people eating seafood include reduced wastage, better utilization, improved distribution channels and growing demand.

According to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), in per capita terms, global food fish consumption grew from 9 kg in 1961 to 20.2 kg in 2015, representing an average expansion rate of 1.5 percent per annum. Its preliminary estimates for 2016 and 2017 point to further growth to about 20.3 kg and 20.5 kg respectively. Moreover, since 1961, the average annual increase in global food fish consumption of 3.2 percent has outpaced the population growth (1.6 percent) and exceeded the consumption of meat from all terrestrial animals combined (2.8 percent), and individually (bovine, ovine, pig and other), except poultry (4.9 percent).

In 2015, fish accounted for approximately 17 percent of animal protein, and 7 percent of all proteins, consumed by the global population. As such, it provided about 3.2 billion people with almost 20 percent of their average per capita intake of animal protein.

Of course, consumption varies significantly across and within regions because of the influence of cultural, economic and geographic factors – ranging from less than 1 kg to more than 100 kg. In general terms, though, of the global total of 149 million metric tons (MT) consumed in 2015, Asia accounted for more than two-thirds (106 million MT and 24 kg per capita), while Oceania and Africa consumed the lowest share.

The FAO also highlights that while consumers in many advanced economies have a wide choice of value-added fish products and are not deterred by price increases, their per capita consumption levels have been approaching their “saturation point” in terms of quantity. It notes that the growth of per capita fish consumption in the EU and United States has slowed in the past few years, and also over the past two decades in Japan (albeit from a high level), while the per capita consumption of poultry and pig meat in these markets has increased.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

Chinese-led supply constraints to drive global seafood prices up by 25 percent

May 2, 2019 — The rising global demand for seafood and a projected slowdown in the growth of fisheries and aquaculture production, particularly by China – the world’s leading provider of these products – will lead to a decade of higher prices, anticipates the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO).

In 2016, total fish production reached an all-time high of 171 million metric tons (MT), with wild-capture fisheries and aquaculture providing 53 percent and 47 percent respectively. Of the total, 88 percent or 151 million MT was utilized for direct human consumption. Capture fisheries production accounted for 90.9 million MT, while aquaculture supplied 80 million MT. Although the contribution of farmed species to human consumption is higher than that of wild-caught fish.

Based on the assumption of higher demand and technological improvements, the overall production is expected to continue to expand, reaching 201 million MT by 2030. While this would represent a growth of 18 percent or 30 million MT over 2016, it amounts to an annual growth rate of just 1 percent for the 2016-2030 period, compared with 2.3 percent for 2003-2016.

By 2030, the FAO expects capture fisheries production to reach about 91 million MT, only 1 percent more than in 2016. It foresees that factors influencing this limited growth will include a 17 percent decrease of capture fisheries in China due to the implementation of new policies, which it reckons will be compensated for by increased catches in a number of other regions. In this regard, it believes there will be higher landings from fishing areas where stocks of certain species are recovering due to improved management, as well as increased catches in waters of the few countries where there are underfished resources, as well as where new fishing opportunities exist or where fisheries management measures are less restrictive.

In addition, the FAO believes there’ll be enhanced use of fisheries production, including reduced onboard discards, waste, and losses as driven by legislation or higher market fish prices. But it also acknowledges that in some years, the El Niño phenomenon can be expected to reduce catches in South America, especially for anchoveta, resulting in an overall decrease of world capture fisheries production of about 2 percent in those years.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

As UN’s SDG14 targets approach, MSC’s Seafood Futures Forum highlights path forward

April 24, 2019 — There’s just one year left to deliver the 2020 targets for the United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goals for Life Below Water (SDG14), and the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) is making a concerted push to reach those goals.

The MSC’s efforts to help the world reach the goals in SDG14 is a big topic at this year’s Seafood Futures Forum, taking place at Seafood Expo Global in Brussels, Belgium on 8 May, from 8 to 11 a.m. Central European Time. The forum is an opportunity for members of both the seafood industry and of environmental NGOs and conservation groups to come together to both get an update on MSC’s current and future efforts to address unsustainable fishing and to discuss what each sector can do to help.

“This year’s Seafood Futures Forum will cut through the talk to explore how the seafood industry and ocean conservation community can work together to deliver meaningful change,” Dr. Yemi Oloruntuyi, head of accessibility at the MSC and a panelist at the forum, said.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

Will plant-based fish food make aquaculture more sustainable?

April 12, 2019 — Replacing fish food with plants may not be as planet-friendly as it seems, according to a new study on the ecological impact of feeding soy and other land-grown crops to farmed seafood. These plant-based feeds are an alternative to, well, other sea creatures, which is what many species like shrimp and salmon eat in the wild. Published in the science journal Sustainability, the new study—which involved which involved an international and multidisciplinary team of experts—quantifies the effects that plant-based feeds have on land, water, and fertilizer use. The numbers that emerge challenge the prevailing notion that simply swapping fish-based fish food for plant-based fare can minimize the environmental footprint of aquaculture.

The interlocking limitations of fish-based feed, also known as fishmeal, have long confounded the aquaculture industry. For one, its ingredients—small, wild fish lower in the food chain, known as forage fish—are a finite resource. And as the global appetite for seafood continues to rise, so does the pressure to catch more. That means that fishmeal is becoming more costly and harder to source. As a result, producers have been trying to reduce their reliance in recent years.

“When shrimp farming became very popular 30 to 35 years ago, there was kind of a preference to grow as many shrimp as you can, as fast as you can, and get them out on the market,” says Cheryl Shew, a representative of specialty feed manufacturer Ziegler Bros. Inc. But like much of the industry, Ziegler began to experiment with soy as a partial substitute fishmeal in its feed products beginning in the early aughts, Shew tells me.

So why not just completely replace fishmeal with plants? It’s not as easy as it sounds—or as environmentally-sound, as it turns out.

Read the full story at The New Food Economy

First ever high-seas conservation treaty would protect life in international waters

April 4, 2019 — No flag can claim the high seas, but many nations exploit them. As a result, life in the two-thirds of the oceans beyond any country’s territorial waters faces many threats that are largely unregulated, including overfishing and the emerging deep-sea mining industry.

Now, nations are negotiating the first-ever high-seas conservation treaty, which the United Nations expects to finalize next year. As delegates met this week at U.N. headquarters in New York City to hash out the details, marine scientists moved to influence the outcome. One research group unveiled the results of a global mapping effort that envisions expansive new marine reserves to protect key high-seas ecosystems. Other teams are working on maps of their own using powerful modeling tools to weigh a reserve’s potential for achieving key conservation goals, such as protecting important feeding grounds or helping sea life adapt to warming seas, against its economic costs.

“The policy opportunity this represents is much rarer than once in a lifetime,” says marine ecologist Douglas McCauley of the University of California, Santa Barbara. Nations are asking “how we should protect two-thirds of the world’s oceans, [and] it’s the first time in human history that this has ever been asked.”

Read the full story at Science Magazine