Current Problems in the Management of Marine Fisheries
Abstract
The public perception of fisheries is that they are in crisis and have been for some time. Numerous scientific and popular articles have pointed to the failures of fisheries management that have caused this crisis. These are widely accepted to be overcapacity in fishing fleets, a failure to take the ecosystem effects of fishing into account, and a failure to enforce unpalatable but necessary reductions in fishing effort on fishing fleets and communities. However, the claims of some analysts that there is an inevitable decline in the status of fisheries is, we believe, incorrect. There have been successes in fisheries management, and we argue that the tools for appropriate management exist. Unfortunately, they have not been implemented widely. Our analysis suggests that management authorities need to develop legally enforceable and tested harvest strategies, coupled with appropriate rights-based incentives to the fishing community, for the future of fisheries to be better than their past.
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References and Notes
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The number of stocks for which the stock status is undetermined depends largely on the number of additional species and stock complexes that are recognized by management authorities. For instance, New Zealand recognizes all its possible stocks, whereas the EU has not yet recognized individual stocks for some of the important bycatch species in EU waters, such as skates and rays. In the United States, 91% of 303 non-FSSI stocks are of undetermined status (see supporting online material).
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We thank numerous colleagues in the fisheries science and management world whose ideas have led to this paper. We dedicate this paper to Dr. Geoff Kirkwood, who tragically died in March 2006. If he had lived, he would have coauthored this paper and improved it considerably.
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Science
Volume 316 | Issue 5832
22 June 2007
22 June 2007
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American Association for the Advancement of Science.
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Published in print: 22 June 2007
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