Journal article
Trawl fishing impacts on the status of seabed fauna in diverse regions of the globe
CSIRO1
University of Rhode Island2
CSIC-UIB - Mediterranean Institute for Advanced Studies3
South African Environmental Observation Network4
Department of Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment5
Centre for the Environment Fisheries and Aquaculture Science6
Ministry of Fisheries and Marine Resources7
Leibniz Institute for Baltic Sea Research8
Centre for Ocean Life, National Institute of Aquatic Resources, Technical University of Denmark9
National Institute of Aquatic Resources, Technical University of Denmark10
Heriot-Watt University11
Bangor University12
International Council for the Exploration of the Sea13
University of Washington14
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration15
Wageningen University & Research16
Centro para el Estudio de Sistemas Marinos17
Luke Natural Resources Institute Finland18
...and 8 moreBottom trawl fishing is a controversial activity. It yields about a quarter of the world's wild seafood, but also has impacts on the marine environment. Recent advances have quantified and improved understanding of large‐scale impacts of trawling on the seabed. However, such information needs to be coupled with distributions of benthic invertebrates (benthos) to assess whether these populations are being sustained under current trawling regimes.
This study collated data from 13 diverse regions of the globe spanning four continents. Within each region, we combined trawl intensity distributions and predicted abundance distributions of benthos groups with impact and recovery parameters for taxonomic classes in a risk assessment model to estimate benthos status.
The exposure of 220 predicted benthos‐group distributions to trawling intensity (as swept area ratio) ranged between 0% and 210% (mean = 37%) of abundance. However, benthos status, an indicator of the depleted abundance under chronic trawling pressure as a proportion of untrawled state, ranged between 0.86 and 1 (mean = 0.99), with 78% of benthos groups > 0.95.
Mean benthos status was lowest in regions of Europe and Africa, and for taxonomic classes Bivalvia and Gastropoda. Our results demonstrate that while spatial overlap studies can help infer general patterns of potential risk, actual risks cannot be evaluated without using an assessment model that incorporates trawl impact and recovery metrics.
These quantitative outputs are essential for sustainability assessments, and together with reference points and thresholds, can help managers ensure use of the marine environment is sustainable under the ecosystem approach to management.
Language: | English |
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Year: | 2021 |
Pages: | 72-86 |
ISSN: | 14672979 and 14672960 |
Types: | Journal article |
DOI: | 10.1111/faf.12506 |
ORCIDs: | 0000-0001-7307-5693 , 0000-0003-2075-4347 , 0000-0002-7315-9341 , 0000-0001-8782-3621 , 0000-0001-7114-830X , 0000-0002-2390-7225 , 0000-0002-8537-3695 , 0000-0003-0785-9662 , 0000-0003-0461-2904 , 0000-0001-7743-4091 , 0000-0002-4319-3522 , 0000-0002-8851-7965 , 0000-0001-6604-4741 , 0000-0002-4973-6698 , 0000-0002-3945-462X , 0000-0001-5850-3813 , 0000-0001-5916-8914 , 0000-0003-4498-9845 , van Denderen, P. Daniël and 0000-0003-2326-2305 |