Sustainable fisheries
Impact of fisheries on the marine environment
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| Impact of fisheries on the marine environment
Fishing can impact the maritime ecosystem in diverse ways, including pollution, bycatch, habitat degradation, and overfishing. Activities that harm seabed habitats, such as bottom trawling, result in habitat degradation. Bycatch, the unintended capture of non-target species, may harm marine populations. Oil spills and plastic (fishing net) rubbish are two examples of pollution from fishing operations that can degrade marine ecosystems. Bottom trawling gear has been widely used for fishing with large fish stocks, but the impact on the seabed after that tends to be intense. According to the Kaiser paper, 2006, bottom trawling has extensively documented and global impacts on benthic communities and habitats, leading to reduced biomass, production, and diversity (Kaiser & De Groot et al., 2000). (“Chronic bottom trawling alters the functional composition of benthic ...”) This impact can further cause a change in species composition, which may further affect the functional diversity of communities. That is, ecosystems are interconnected and serve each other as a source of food and energy, so some organisms lose their food dependency when the environment is destroyed or harmed. Typical examples are corals and parrotfish. Fishing is pivotal in biodiversity impact, loss, or reduction by depleting the number of organisms or species. Globally, fishing is not seen on a small scale anymore; instead, it has been observed to be in commercial quantities. In doing so, it has contributed to the depletion of fish species and severely impacted the environment due to using mechanized equipment. The use of these types of equipment causes habitat destruction. Furthermore, fishing can cause ecosystem collapse by removing a particular species of fish like tuna, marlin, or swordfish, which are the higher trophic levels fish that are desirable, and a total removal of such species can impact the ecosystem. Overfishing The most catastrophic consequence of overfishing is the extinction of species. The most severe consequence of overfishing is the potential to destroy the marine ecosystem and abolish future catches for the remaining species and the ecosystems that rely on them. Overfishing is rarely monitored or managed since the regions where it occurs are generally remote. As a result, it is impossible to establish the number of fish taken from the area and manage the effort. Once the fish are depleted, the fishermen move on to another place and continue the process, causing economic and ecological damage. In circumstances of heavy overfishing, the species may become so depleted that commercial amounts are no longer available, causing the fishery to fail. According to the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation, the global rate of stock collapse climbed from 0.1% in the 1970s to 1% in the 1990s, where it has stayed since. Download 114.03 Kb. Share with your friends:
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