Contemporary Methods and Future Trends In Fishery Management And Development

Abstract

Fisheries management is best viewed as it departs from what might be called "nonmanagement" – when there are no interventions. Left unmanaged, fisheries develop to successive periods of stability that are ultimately characterized by relatively fixed techniques of harvest and a fixed total catch. The catch changes from a few preferred species to any acceptable species, and stabilizes on a few species most capable of withstanding the harvesting. Even in the simplest case of single jurisdiction fisheries for a single species efforts are largely tentative and feeble. Where management achieves the objective of regulating total catch, it is commonly accompanied by technological paralysis and economic inefficiency, unless entry into the fishery is limited. Multinational coastal fisheries add the element of reconciliation of differing social and economic goals, and over-riding considerations of national interest. The question of what constitutes a suitable management zone is troublesome and there is no simple rule of any biological significance. Pelagic fishes are particularly vulnerable to overexploitation from multinational fisheries. Anadromous species have the added element of investment in preservation of the obligatory freshwater environment. Fisheries management will increasingly be considered in the more general contexts of management of marine resources and the impacts of land use on the world’s oceans. Aquaculture gives promise of potential for fish production in strategic places. The logic of these operations seems indisputable in the long run, and they should increasingly contribute to world fish production.In broad perspective it seems likely that levels of exploitation of existing fisheries are approaching those that are maximally sustainable. There is urgency in the need to intervene successfully in the largely unmanaged fisheries of the world. The present set of devices to accomplish these ends is essentially a patchwork of agreements supported by only the most general principles of international agreement. For the future the paths are: to let the fisheries run an unmanaged course to eventual stabilization, posing risks of creating situations that may not readily be rehabilitated; to consider radical new kinds of international agreements; or to develop the present pattern of agreements more vigorously. The prospect seems to be for only limited success on the third path, with a difficult transition to more stabilized world fisheries partly a product of management and partly of nonmanagement. The development of new technologies and social attitudes could lead to different prospects for the use of the world’s living ocean resources.