Definitions of overfishing from an ecosystem perspective

Murawski, S. A. 2000. Definitions of overfishing from an ecosystem perspective. –ICES Journal of Marine Science, 57: 649–658.Ecosystem considerations may be incorporated into fisheries management by modify-ing existing overfishing paradigms or by developing new approaches to account forecosystem structure and function in relation to harvesting. Although existing conceptsof overfishing have a strong theoretical basis for evaluating policy choices and muchpractical use, they do not provide direct guidance on issues such as biodiversity, serialdepletion, habitat degradation, and changes in the food web caused by fishing. Thereis, however, little basis for defining optimum fishing by using related metrics such asdiversity indices, slopes of size or diversity spectra, or average trophic level of thecatch, and these may produce ambiguous results. If ecosystem-based overfishingconcepts are to assume a greater role in management, unambiguous, quantifiable,and predictive measures of ecosystem state and flux must be developed to index:(1) biomass and production by the ecosystem and relationships among its parts,(2) diversity at different levels of organization, (3) patterns of resource variability, and(4) social and economic benefits. Ecosystem considerations do not need to substitutefor existing overfishing concepts. Instead, they should be used to evaluate and modifyprimary management guidance for important fisheries and species. In practice, theyemphasize the need to manage fishing capacity, supported by broader use of technicalmeasures such as marine protected areas and gear restrictions.

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