Small-scale fisheries in Malaysia. Photo by Jamie Oliver – WorldFish, Flickr.
A week before Brussels’ Ocean Week and a few months before the UN Ocean Conference in Nice, a group of researchers published the results of an unprecedented scientific effort: they redefine the concept of ‘sustainable fishing’ and propose eleven ‘golden rules’ that radically challenge the flawed notion that currently prevails in fisheries management.
River fishing in Ontario, Canada. Photo from Pxhere.
The Sea Around Us has published the first product in a massive undertaking that started in 2022: reconstructing the world’s freshwater fisheries catches.
On July 1, 2024, the Sea Around Us initiative based at the University of British Columbia’s Institute for the Oceans and Fisheries will turn 25.
Still in its young adult years, the project’s accomplishments are no small feat.
In July 2024, the Sea Around Us turns 25 years old.
During this quarter-century, the project has been dedicated to examining the impacts of fisheries on the marine ecosystems of the world. It has been and remains instrumental in ocean conservation.
The Sea Around Us project manager, Dr. Maria ‘Deng’ Palomares, with Belizean fishers. Photo by the Belize Fisheries Project.
Belizean fishers’ experience in the water confirms the declining trends in fishery catches – and, therefore, in fish populations – uncovered by the Belize Fisheries Project (BFP), of which the Sea Around Us is a member together with Comunidad y Biodiversidad (COBI), the Environmental Law Institute (ELI), Healthy Reefs for Healthy People Initiative (HRI) and MRAG Americas.