• About
    • Which Energy Mix is this?
  • Climate News Network Archive
  • Contact
The climate news that makes a difference.
No Result
View All Result
The Energy Mix
  • Canada
  • UK & Europe
  • Fossil Fuels
  • Ending Emissions
  • Community Climate Finance
  • Clean Electricity Grid
  • Cities & Communities
SUBSCRIBE
DONATE
  • Canada
  • UK & Europe
  • Fossil Fuels
  • Ending Emissions
  • Community Climate Finance
  • Clean Electricity Grid
  • Cities & Communities
SUBSCRIBE
DONATE
No Result
View All Result
The Energy Mix
No Result
View All Result
  • Canada
  • UK & Europe
  • Fossil Fuels
  • Ending Emissions
  • Community Climate Finance
  • Clean Electricity Grid
  • Cities & Communities
  FEATURED
Danske Bank Quits New Fossil Fuel Financing January 23, 2023
Extreme Warming Ahead Even as Worst-Case Scenarios Grow ‘Obsolete’ January 23, 2023
Notley Scorches Federal Just Transition Bill as Fossil CEO Calls for Oilsands Boom January 23, 2023
IRON OXIDE: New Battery Brings Long-Duration Storage to Grids, 750 Jobs to West Virginia January 23, 2023
BREAKING: GFANZ Banks, Investors Pour Hundreds of Billions into Fossil Fuels January 17, 2023
Next
Prev

Abundant fish need cool seas and protection

September 17, 2018
Reading time: 3 minutes
Primary Author: Tim Radford

 

There may indeed be abundant fish in the sea – but only if nations confront overfishing and limit global warming.

LONDON, 17 September, 2018 – US and Japanese scientists have worked out how to encourage more abundant fish populations, deliver more food for human consumption and make more profits for the world’s fishermen and women.

  • Concise headlines. Original content. Timely news and views from a select group of opinion leaders. Special extras.
  • Everything you need, nothing you don’t.
  • The Weekender: The climate news you need.
New!
Subscribe

The answer is simple. First, the seagoing nations must introduce effective fisheries management practices.

And second, they must limit global warming to the 2°C already agreed by 195 nations in Paris in 2015.

If these two things happen, then in principle global fishing could be sustainable, and oceans could be highly productive for decades to come. In theory global profits could rise by $14bn a year and the global catch by 217 million tonnes a year.

But, the scientists warn, inaction on either option would mean even more dramatic losses of fish, lower incomes for those working in fishing, and shrinking supplies of protein for an ever-hungrier world.

“If we can adopt sustainable fishing policies and keep global warming at no more than 2°C, we can still realise significant benefits to fisheries”

Right now, the global harvest is 80 million tonnes a year and fish provide 20% of the animal protein for around 3 billion people.

The world’s oceans are warming, and well-established fishing grounds have begun to change as valuable fish migrate to cooler habitats. Researchers have warned that stormier weather promised by climate change could make fishing more dangerous.

The dangerous mix of warmer oceans and greater pressure on fishing grounds could damage the health of the oceans.

But researchers report in the journal Science Advances that they tested possible future outcomes for 915 fish stocks around the world – these constitute up to 67% of present global catch – under alternative scenarios for fisheries management and for climate change.

Positive results

They thought about the impact of a changing climate on fishes’ productivity and range, under climate regimes in which temperatures rose by no more than 1°C (the world has already warmed by 1°C in the past century) to the 4°C predicted under the notorious business-as-usual scenario, in which nations just go on burning fossil fuels at ever greater rates, to load ever more greenhouse gases into the atmosphere.

“The results from this study are surprisingly positive – if we can adopt sustainable fishing policies and keep global warming at no more than 2°C, we can still realise significant benefits to fisheries across the globe,” said Merrick Burden, senior economist with the Environmental Defense Fund oceans programme and one of the authors.

“But these benefits require action, and this study serves as a wake-up call to governments that they must change the way that fishing takes place or risk losing a crucial opportunity to secure our food supply for generations to come.”

Even if nations co-operate, and save the oceans, there will be losers. Profits in tropical waters will dwindle; equatorial nations – many of them dependent on seafood – will be hardest hit.

Winners and losers

Nearly all species will experience changes in productivity; half of all the species examined will shift their grounds and migrate across national offshore boundaries.

“Even with the right management changes, there will be winners and losers, and we have to tackle this head-on,” said Steven Gaines, dean of the University of California Santa Barbara’s school of environmental science, who led the research.

“Success will require not only emissions reductions but also multilateral cooperation and real changes in fisheries management.

“With our growing global population and the increasing needs for healthy sources of protein, these changes will be critical for meeting the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.” – Climate News Network



in Climate News Network

The latest climate news and analysis, direct to your inbox

Subscribe

Related Posts

U.S. Geological Survey/wikimedia commons
Biodiversity & Habitat

Climate Change Amplifies Risk of ‘Insect Apocalypse’

December 1, 2022
42
Alaa Abd El-Fatah/wikimedia commons
COP Conferences

Rights Abuses, Intrusive Conference App Put Egypt Under Spotlight as COP 27 Host

November 14, 2022
26
Western Arctic National Parklands/wikimedia commons
Arctic & Antarctica

Arctic Wildfires Show Approach of New Climate Feedback Loop

January 2, 2023
27

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

I agree to the Terms & Conditions and Privacy Policy.

Trending Stories

RL0919/wikimedia commons

Danske Bank Quits New Fossil Fuel Financing

January 23, 2023
2k
Weirton, WV by Jon Dawson/flickr

IRON OXIDE: New Battery Brings Long-Duration Storage to Grids, 750 Jobs to West Virginia

January 23, 2023
477
Rachel Notley/Facebook

Notley Scorches Federal Just Transition Bill as Fossil CEO Calls for Oilsands Boom

January 23, 2023
234
EcoAnalytics

Albertans Want a Just Transition, Despite Premier’s Grumbling

January 23, 2023
180
@tongbingxue/Twitter

Extreme Warming Ahead Even as Worst-Case Scenarios Grow ‘Obsolete’

January 23, 2023
238
Masaki Ikeda/wikimedia commons

Wind Turbines Trigger ‘Thundersnow’ During Buffalo Snowstorm

November 27, 2022
830

Recent Posts

Sergio Boscaino/flickr

Dubai Mulls Quitting C40 Cities Over ‘Costly’ Climate Target

January 24, 2023
78
hangela/pixabay

New UK Coal Mine Faces Two Legal Challenges

January 24, 2023
40

Gas Stoves Enter U.S. Climate Culture War, Become ‘Bellwether’ for Industry

January 22, 2023
70
Jeff Hitchcock/flickr.

BREAKING: GFANZ Banks, Investors Pour Hundreds of Billions into Fossil Fuels

January 23, 2023
488

Exxon Had the Right Global Warming Numbers Through Decades of Denial: Study

January 17, 2023
223
willenhallwench / Pixabay

Ontario Greenwashes with ‘Misleading, Illegitimate’ Emission Credits

January 16, 2023
308
Next Post

Contradictions beset China’s climate path

The Energy Mix - The climate news you need

Copyright 2023 © Energy Mix Productions Inc. All rights reserved.

  • About
  • Contact
  • Privacy Policy and Copyright
  • Cookie Policy

Proudly partnering with…

scf_withtagline
No Result
View All Result
  • Canada
  • UK & Europe
  • Fossil Fuels
  • Ending Emissions
  • Community Climate Finance
  • Clean Electricity Grid
  • Cities & Communities

Copyright 2022 © Smarter Shift Inc. and Energy Mix Productions Inc. All rights reserved.

Manage Cookie Consent
To provide the best experiences, we use technologies like cookies to store and/or access device information. Consenting to these technologies will allow us to process data such as browsing behaviour or unique IDs on this site. Not consenting or withdrawing consent, may adversely affect certain features and functions.
Functional Always active
The technical storage or access is strictly necessary for the legitimate purpose of enabling the use of a specific service explicitly requested by the subscriber or user, or for the sole purpose of carrying out the transmission of a communication over an electronic communications network.
Preferences
The technical storage or access is necessary for the legitimate purpose of storing preferences that are not requested by the subscriber or user.
Statistics
The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for statistical purposes. The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for anonymous statistical purposes. Without a subpoena, voluntary compliance on the part of your Internet Service Provider, or additional records from a third party, information stored or retrieved for this purpose alone cannot usually be used to identify you.
Marketing
The technical storage or access is required to create user profiles to send advertising, or to track the user on a website or across several websites for similar marketing purposes.
Manage options Manage services Manage vendors Read more about these purposes
View preferences
{title} {title} {title}