SEAFOOD.COM NEWS by John Sackton – February 26, 2014 — The Economist Ocean summit being held in California is a high level meeting – with involvement from the deputy chief of the UN, US Secretary of State John Kerry, and some of the heads of Fortune 500 hospitality and energy companies, as well as some heads of state.
Of course it is also a preening ground for NGO’s who both want to emphasize the message of disaster – the oceans are collapsing, while taking credit for being able to fix them.
We have given this meeting a lot of coverage today with stories and presentations from John Kerry, Julie Packard, and the Economist. The reason is that we don't want to throw the baby out with the bathwater. We may have a reflexive dislike of Enviornmental NGO preening at the conference, but that should not detract from supporting some of the legitimate ideas that will build long term ocean ecosystem viability.
John Kerry, in contrast to the other speakers, correctly identified that only around 1/3 of fisheries are overexploited, as confirmed by the FAO, and did not fall into the trap of calling fully exploited fisheries unsustainable.
He also highlighted two other important impacts on ocean health: agricultural runoff, and climate change including ocean acidification, brought about by uncontrolled carbon emissions.
The Economist magazine has also made some sensible suggestions, that should have wide industry and government support. They include an end to fishing subsidies- especially in the EU, which support overcapacity in high seas fisheries as well as in fisheries off Africa, and a required international registry of fishing vessels – similar to that which exists with cargo ships.
Both things will help reduce IUU fishing.
John Kerry also supported steps to improve government regulation and fight IUU fishing. He commented that he and Ted Stevens had worked to get the UN ban on driftnet fishing ratified.
There are also some more questionable ideas being floated at the conference. One involves developing a UN Ocean agency. It is not clear that the ocean itself is a good organizing principle, when we already have initiatives through Regional Fisheries Management Organizations, the FAO, the UN environmental program, the Intergovernmental Commission on Climate Change, the Law of the Sea treaty, and various international shipping regulatory bodies. All of these efforts could be improved without a new agency.
There is also a reflexive support for Marine reserves. Kerry made the point that about 8% to 10% of terrestrial land is protected in some fashion, but for the oceans it is only around 1%.
The seafood industry in both Alaska and California has supported the creation of some marine reserves, but only in Australia has there been a large scale push to create reserves that seriously cut back on fishing. The issue with reserves is that undefined, marine reserves are a catchall phrase like motherhood and apple pie – that automatically are good.
Yet the actual issues in marine reserves are more complicated. What is the scientific goal? Will it be accomplished through a reserve? How will that be measured. What activities will contribute to that goal, and what will not impact it.
The fishing industry has a long record of making huge contributions in terms of accepting restrictions, higher costs, limits on gear, on vessel type and fishing seasons and methods, because in most cases there is a direct connection between the action and the result.
Marine reserves fall outside of this system. So that is why the seafood industry is more skeptical about reserves: they have to be better defined.
The very lack of definition also makes them attractive to environmental groups who want to claim a victory for conservation; but may not want to do the hard work of evaluating the trade offs.
All the speakers at the conference have underplayed the role of seafood in global food security except for the World Bank, and any large scale move towards more marine reserves should happen in the context of evaluating the needs for global food security as well.
Finally, most speakers have not really acknowledged the fact that increased demand for seafood is being fulfilled by aquaculture – not more pressure on wild stocks. Those in the industry are already seeing climate change, ocean acidification, and illegal fishing as all having more impact than the simple minded statement that global fisheries are overfished.
So in evaluating the conference, it is important not to through the baby out with the bathwater. There are some good ideas here worthy of broad support, and governments should implement them.
This story originally appeared on Seafood.com, a subscription site. It is reprinted with permission.