EDFish

Selected tag(s): ocean ecosystems

Supporting climate-resilient fisheries during the UN Decade of Ocean Science

By EDF’s Jacob Eurich and Kristin Kleisner, and Kathy Mills, Gulf of Maine Research Institute

Fisheries, including the systems for harvesting, processing and marketing blue foods, are an important pillar of many economies, supporting hundreds of millions of livelihoods. Small-scale fisheries and aquaculture produce more than half of the global fish catch and two-thirds of all the blue foods we eat. Climate change continues to threaten fisheries, altering ocean ecosystems and transforming fish stocks, with climate-induced losses disproportionately impacting the regions and people most dependent on fish for protein and micronutrients—predominantly small-scale fishers in developing, small-island nations in the tropics.  Read More »

Posted in International, Science/Research / Also tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | Comments are closed

Collaborative research sheds light on creating climate-resilient multispecies fisheries

Worldwide, there is considerable interest in developing fishery management options that balance social, economic and ecological goals for multispecies fisheries. Ideally, fisheries management should strive not only to produce good yields from single stocks, but also to avoid serial depletion and prevent adverse impacts of fishing on marine ecosystems — a difficult, but achievable task. Read More »

Posted in Cuba, International, Mexico, Policy, Science/Research / Also tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Comments are closed

IUCN WCC | Sustainable fisheries & biodiversity conservation — working together in the face of climate change

Over the past week, representatives from organizations and countries from around the world have come together for critical discussions about protecting and enhancing biodiversity in the face of climate change at the IUCN World Conservation Congress in Marseille, France. For the first time at the WCC, restoring ocean health was one of the central discussion themes, as a “marine journey.”

Read More »

Posted in Belize, Cuba, International, Policy / Also tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Comments are closed

Will fisheries management best practices need to adapt as climate change impacts the ocean?

Editor’s note: This is the second in a multi-part blog series, Fisheries for the Future, examining the impacts from climate change on global fisheries and the opportunities to address these emerging challenges. Throughout the series, we’ll be investigating how climate change will impact the world’s supply and distribution of fish and what we can do to ensure the most sustainable future for ourselves and our planet. Learn more about this work: Resilient Seas

Doctors say a healthy patient is better able to recover from an injury than an unhealthy one. As our colleagues at the University of British Columbia point out, this is similar to healthy marine ecosystems, where a healthy ecosystem is better able to withstand the effects of climate change compared to an unhealthy one. Managing fisheries right is one of the most important factors for addressing marine ecosystem health. In this blog we will talk about fishery management best practices and their importance in the face of climate change, how those practices may look different as a result of climate-related factors and some recent experiences with fisheries in Lithuania.

Over the last few decades we have learned what it takes to manage fisheries well and have worked with fishing communities around the world to develop robust management plans that are yielding positive results for fish populations and fishing communities. Read More »

Posted in Climate and Fisheries Series / Also tagged , , | Comments are closed

At The Brink: Ocean Tipping Points

Healthy Coral in the Gardens of the Queen, Cuba. Photo: Noel Lopez Fernandez

Healthy sponge in the Gardens of the Queen, Cuba. Photo: Noel Lopez Fernandez

Coral reefs seem delicate, but when they are healthy they can take a lot of abuse.  I’ve seen corals recover from severe hurricanes and even volcanic eruptions. But coral reefs can also transition suddenly from colorful, vibrant ecosystems to mere shadows of themselves.  Decades of scientific investigation have shed a lot of light on this, and in a recent publication, my colleagues and I summarize a lot of the data that have been collected on Caribbean coral reefs to identify where these dangerous “tipping points” are.  This work is part of the Ocean Tipping Points project, a collaboration between several institutions aimed at finding tipping points in all kinds of marine ecosystems so that managers can implement measures that will keep these ecosystems well away from the brink. Read More »

Posted in Cuba, International, Science/Research / Also tagged , , , | Read 2 Responses