After the collapse of herring and cod stocks in the western Baltic Sea, flatfish such as plaice, flounder, and dab now dominate the catch. However, they can't replace the lost catch of cod and herring. Photo by Ilka Thomsen, GEOMAR.

Fisheries research overestimates fish stocks

After the collapse of herring and cod stocks in the western Baltic Sea, flatfish such as plaice, flounder, and dab now dominate the catch. However, they can't replace the lost catch of cod and herring. Photo by Ilka Thomsen, GEOMAR.

After the collapse of herring and cod stocks in the western Baltic Sea, flatfish such as plaice, flounder, and dab now dominate the catch. However, they can’t replace the lost catch of cod and herring. Photo by Ilka Thomsen, GEOMAR.

As the abundance of global fish populations continues to deteriorate, top fisheries researchers are calling for simpler yet more accurate stock assessment models that avoid overly optimistic scientific advice, which ends up encouraging overfishing.

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Black Snapper (or black and white snapper), Macolor niger at Gota Sorayer, Red Sea, Egypt. Photo by Derek Keats, Wikimedia Commons.

What if we stopped thinking of fish as commodities?

Black Snapper (or black and white snapper), Macolor niger at Gota Sorayer, Red Sea, Egypt. Photo by Derek Keats, Wikimedia Commons.

Black Snapper (or black and white snapper), Macolor niger at Gota Sorayer, Red Sea, Egypt. Photo by Derek Keats, Wikimedia Commons.

In a recent piece published in the journal PLOS Biology, the Sea Around Us alumna and NYU professor Jennifer Jacquet, and our principal investigator, Daniel Pauly, ponder the idea of wild fish and invertebrates being considered more like wild animals and less like tradable commodities.

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