State of global fisheries – trends and predictions

• Main Author: Alicja Dabrowska
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: University of Gdansk 2012-09-01
• Series: Contemporary Economy
• Subjects: Overfishing; Ecosystem; Models; Food security; Ecopath
• Online Access: http://www.wspolczesnagospodarka.pl/?p=537

As human population on Earth has just reached seven billion, food, freshwater and energy supplies are of increasing concern. With fisheries supporting hundreds of millions livelihoods and most of the global capture fisheries production coming from the marine environment, sustainable management of fishing activity based on sound scientific data and reasonable predictions is one of the major issues we face these days. Literature review of the most recent publications on the state of global fisheries was conducted and ten main trends were identified, including expansion of fishing to new ecosystems and species, decline in landings, increase in fishing effort, growth of aquaculture and changes in the abundance and distribution of species. Issues with predicting the future were discussed, as well as usefulness of computer models and possible recovery of the ecosystem.