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We assess progress towards Aichi Biodiversity Target 6, which aims to achieve global fisheries sustainability by 2020. Current trends suggest that the proportion of fish stocks within safe ecological limits is likely to decline until 2020. While model projections show a considerable reduction in overexploited stocks by 2050 if climate change is not considered, there will be a substantial increase in the risk of overexploited fish stocks if climate change is taken into account. Overall, although there is progress toward rebuilding fisheries in some developed nations, this improvement is insufficient to meet the Aichi Target by 2020; there is a need for substantial changes to current fisheries policy and management if Target 6 is to be met.

Climate change–reflected in significant environmental changes such as warming, sea level rise, shifts in salinity, oxygen and other ocean conditions–is expected to impact marine organisms and associated fisheries. This study provides an assessment of the potential impacts on, and the vulnerability of, marine biodiversity and fisheries catches in the Arabian Gulf under climate change. To this end, using three separate niche modelling approaches under a ‘business-as-usual’ climate change scenario, we projected the future habitat suitability of the Arabian Gulf (also known as the Persian Gulf) for 55 expert-identified priority species, including charismatic and non-fish species. Second, we conducted a vulnerability assessment of national economies to climate change impacts on fisheries. The modelling outputs suggested a high rate of local extinction (up to 35% of initial species richness) by 2090 relative to 2010. Spatially, projected local extinctions are highest in the southwestern part of the Gulf, off the coast of Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates (UAE). While the projected patterns provided useful indicators of potential climate change impacts on the region’s diversity, the magnitude of changes in habitat suitability are more uncertain. Fisheries-specific results suggested reduced future catch potential for several countries on the western side of the Gulf, with projections differing only slightly among models. Qatar and the UAE were particularly affected, with more than a 26% drop in future fish catch potential. Integrating changes in catch potential with socio-economic indicators suggested the fisheries of Bahrain and Iran may be most vulnerable to climate change. We discuss limitations of the indicators and the methods used, as well as the implications of our overall findings for conservation and fisheries management policies in the region.

The pursuit of interdisciplinarity in the marine sciences is at last beginning to come into its own, but the kind of interdisciplinarity that bridges the social, human, health, and natural science realms remains rare. This article traces the evolution of my own history of interdisciplinarity from its early days when I worked in two disciplines, to the present when I have worked with many others to bring together the natural sciences, social sciences, humanities, and earth/ocean sciences in large projects that illuminate the interconnectedness of all these parts of knowledge acquisition. In the process, I have broadened my intellectual vision both in scope and scale, uncovering the many ways in which, quite pragmatically, the very local and the international are more tightly interconnected than is often realized, with all the implications for fisheries governance that that implies. This, then, is both a story and, I hope, a pathway to a rewarding way for young and middle-career fisheries scholars to pursue their research. (Full publication)

1. Ocean systems, and the culturally and commercially important fishes that inhabit them, face growing threats. Increasingly, unconventional data sources are being used to inform fisheries research and management for data‐poor species.
2. Listed as a species of special concern in Canada, yelloweye rockfish (Sebastes ruberrimus) are vulnerable to exploitation, and have historical and cultural value to Indigenous people. In this study, Indigenous fishers of British Columbia, Canada, were interviewed and asked about observed changes to the body sizes (length) and abundance of this species over the last ~60 years, and the factors driving these changes. Their current and historical estimates of size and abundance were compared with current biological survey data.
3. Forty‐two semi‐directed interviews were carried out and 89% of respondents observed a decrease in yelloweye rockfish body sizes since the 1980s. The median historical (1950s–1980s) length was 84 cm, compared with the median modern (2010–2015) length of 46 cm. All but one respondent reported substantial decrease in yelloweye rockfish abundance since their earliest fishing experiences (1950s to1980s, depending on participant’s age), with a third suggesting the change was most evident in the early 2000s, followed by the 1980s (21%) and 1990s (17%).
4. Sizes of modern yelloweye rockfish estimated by participants resembled estimates derived from ecological data recorded concurrently at the study region.
5. This study illustrates a repeatable method for using traditional and local knowledge to extend baselines for data‐poor species, and highlights the value of integrating Indigenous knowledge into fisheries research and management.

Background: Conservation decisions not only impact wildlife, habitat, and environmental health, but also human wellbeing and social justice. The inclusion of safeguards and equity considerations in the conservation field has increasingly garnered attention in international policy processes and amongst conservation practitioners. Yet, what constitutes an ‘equitable’ solution can take many forms, and how the concept is treated within conservation research is not standardized. This review explores how social equity is conceptualized and assessed in conservation research.

Atlantic bluefin tuna (ABFT) (Thunnus thynnus) is both an iconic sport fish, with a history of competitive fishing in the Atlantic region (including the largest individual ever caught, in Auld’s Cove, Nova Scotia), and the target of a significant commercial fishery throughout much of its range. The latter is partly driven by the fact that the species is highly valued in the sushi and sashimi markets, but it also has wider markets. The combination of a recreational and large scale industrial fishery is an unusual, if not unique, challenge with respect to the choice of management approaches.

The ocean is the next frontier for many conservation and development activities. Growth in marine protected areas, fisheries management, the blue economy, and marine spatial planning initiatives are occurring both within and beyond national jurisdictions. This mounting activity has coincided with increasing concerns about sustainability and international attention to ocean governance. Yet, despite growing concerns about exclusionary decision-making processes and social injustices, there remains inadequate attention to issues of social justice and inclusion in ocean science, management, governance and funding. In a rapidly changing and progressively busier ocean, we need to learn from past mistakes and identify ways to navigate a just and inclusive path towards sustainability. Proactive attention to inclusive decision-making and social justice is needed across key ocean policy realms including marine conservation, fisheries management, marine spatial planning, the blue economy, climate adaptation and global ocean governance for both ethical and instrumental reasons. This discussion paper aims to stimulate greater engagement with these critical topics. It is a call to action for ocean-focused researchers, policy-makers, managers, practitioners, and funders.

The ocean is a critical source of nutrition for billions of people, with potential to yield further food, profits, and employment in the future (1). But fisheries face a serious new challenge as climate change drives the ocean to conditions not experienced historically. Local, national, regional, and international fisheries are substantially underprepared for geographic shifts in marine animals driven by climate change over the coming decades. Fish and other animals have already shifted into new territory at a rate averaging 70 km per decade (2), and these shifts are expected to continue or accelerate (3). We show here that many species will likely shift across national and other political boundaries in the coming decades, creating the potential for conflict over newly shared resources.

Identifying vulnerable habitats is necessary to designing and prioritizing efficient marine protected areas (MPAs) to sustain the renewal of living marine resources. However, vulnerable habitats rarely become MPAs due to conflicting interests such as fishing. We propose a spatial framework to help researchers and managers determine optimal conservation areas in a multi-species fishery, while also considering the economic relevance these species may have in a given society, even in data poor situations. We first set different ecological criteria (i.e. species resilience, vulnerability and trophic level) to identify optimal areas for conservation and restoration efforts, which was based on a traditional conservationist approach. We then identified the most economically relevant sites, where the bulk of fishery profits come from. We overlapped the ecologically and economically relevant areas using different thresholds. By ranking the level of overlap between the sites, representing different levels of conflicts between traditional conservation and fishing interests, we suggest alternatives that could increase fishers’ acceptance of protected areas. The introduction of some flexibility in the way conservation targets are established could contribute to reaching a middle ground where biological concerns are integrated with economic demands from the fishing sector. (Full publication)

(book chapter (chapter 10) in The Changing Wealth of Nations 2018: Building a Sustainable Future)

• After steadily increasing over decades, annual global production of capture fisheries has plateaued just above 80 million metric tons. From a peak of 86 million tons in 1996, global marine catches have shown a small downward trend of about 0.2 million ton per year.
• Globally, the proportion of fully fished stocks and overfished, depleted, or recovering fish stocks has increased from slightly more than 50 percent of all assessed fish stocks in the mid-1970s to about 75 percent in 2005, and to almost 90 percent in 2013.
• As global marine catches have stagnated and even declined, fishing effort has greatly expanded over the past 70 years. Over the same period the level of global marine catches has not even doubled, suggesting a steep decline in the catch per unit effort, often considered a measure of fishing productivity.
• At the global level, the data show that, overall, global fisheries have foregone US$83 billion of rent in 2012. Fisheries are heavily subsidized and in many countries resource rents from fisheries are negative—meaning that revenues do not fully cover the costs of fishing.