Nearly one hundred years of developments in fisheries science have contributed to the present basis for the management of fisheries. However, recent events in the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans that have affected the climate and biological production over extensive areas have also had remarkable impact on the views of many fishery scientists and managers about neritic fish resources and what to expect from them. This, of course, increases the demand for new and improved methods and theory.
In some areas, such as the North Atlantic and North Pacific, complex and highly developed fisheries are measured, monitored and reviewed periodically in order to plan and implement more or less elaborated mechanisms for fisheries management. There are, however, many other areas where the information for managing fisheries are not sufficient or management based on scientific information is just not common practice.
Of course one could argue that management and the information for it will evolve where and as it is needed, but if we are to review typical management effectiveness, as applied to many fisheries, we may find that, mostly when it was needed, the results were poor or even tended to stimulate competition, over-exploitation and either resource collapse or failure of the economics of the fishery, or both. Examples are numerous, and several cases are documented in this volume.
The major failing of available fishery monitoring tools and methods is that they tend to integrate out variation and generate mean expectations which are not conservative during resource recessions, for whatever reasons, and they tend to under-estimate what is going on during growth periods. While equilibrium or steady-state processes are useful conceptual devices, they are inadequate for dealing with dynamic and highly variable resources which are themselves merely reflections of larger, dynamic ecological systems, and the related climate-ocean driven processes which are so difficult to measure or forecast on any but the shortest time-space scales. Certainly, new concepts and alternative methods are needed to properly deal with fisheries and fishery resources that are obviously affected by environmental changes that usually go unnoticed by conventional fishery monitoring systems and available measuring tools. One consequence of this is that management options end by being limited to very short-term reactions based on short time and limited space-scale forecasts, if any management reaction occurs at all.
Even the concept of short-term balancing, where some key parameters can be assumed to be constant, finds itself in contrast with recent events in some major neritic zones. For example, there have been unprecedent blooms of valuable cephalopods and their fisheries off northwest Africa; off equatorial Africa, the balistes bloom has been equally remarkable even though the estimated potential is not yet fully exploited. Also the three Pacific Basin populations of sardines have flown in the face of all theory by exploding their numbers and colonizing old and new habitats, all in spite of intense fishing activities. Like all such phenomena, the questions far outnumber the answers. As a prelude to these changes there have been notorious fishery collapses, with all the associated finger pointing and babbling over why management failed to "save" that fishery. A question needing to be answered is whether conventional management could have been able to prevent the resource collapse, and in either case, whether it could have changed anything regarding the fishery's failure and its impact on the national economies and society?
This Expert Consultation is a timely follow-on to many related regional or topical symposiums, workshops and research programmes that had been channeling the attention of the scientific community towards a more comprehensive approach to fisheries sciences, resources variability, its cause and consequences. Listing them all will be impossible, therefore, we will only refer to those scientific events that more directly have influenced this consultation. Starting from the ICES Symposium on the Assessment and Management of Pelagic Fish Stocks in Aberdeen in 1978; the Lima Workshop on the Effects of Environmental Variation on Survival of Larval Pelagic Fishes; and the ICANE review of joint Canadian-Peruvian research into the finer scales and highly dynamic nature of the Humboldt Current off Peru. Also the IOC Resolution XI-17 has provided stimulus for FAO to give appropriate consideration to the topic of Ocean Science in Relation to Living Resources (OSLR) in international contexts.
Who should be responsible for managing fishery resources, and what information is needed if catch statistics alone, if available at all, cannot be used to forecast either blooms or recessions of major fishery resources? Who should be responsible for the societal burdens upon collapse of a fishery? Should the industry and investors always be the major winners in the cycle of bloom and recession; receiving low cost loans or subsidies for initial investments, and being given tax relief or even benefitting from buy-back schemes when the economic returns decline or become negative during poor periods? The fishermen and shore-based support facilities and labour forces are too often left holding an empty bag, the profits having been exported along with the catches. It appears that in fisheries based on volatile bloom and recession based resources, it pays to lose if you are an early investor. The taxpayers will be passed the bills for initial investments as well as the relief programmes after a collapse occurs.
Of course all this takes place behind the smoke-screens provided by the continuous speculations of various "experts" on what could or should be done to "rationalize" the fisheries once the declines are noted. Numerous examples of typical future exercises are provided in these Proceedings, in which the tug-of-war between Industry, Fishery Science and Politics is resolved only by the collapse of another resource. The onus is always on the "Scientist" to prove his position, rather than upon Industry, whose position is usually simply to take short-term gains and move on. It appears to be a huge tragiccommedy in which the self-righteous scientist is the goat, the fisherman and national taxpayers are the losers, and the exporters and outside investors usually remain anonymous winners.
One should not feel too much sympathy for fishery scientists who are too limited in their approach to measuring and monitoring the dynamic Oceans and their living contents. Some large fraction of fishery scientists appear content with giving only partial answers based on their conventional wisdoms and methods. That these might be completely inadequate or even inappropriate to the task is rarely an issue among them. Just what information is needed to cope with varying resources? This is what this Expert Consultation was about, and we are certain that answers will be found in the contributions produced for, and the Reports produced from the Expert Consultation. All contributions that were accepted for presentation are included in this volume either in full or in summary form.
The reports produced from the consultation are incorporated in the Report of the Expert Consultation, published in the first volume of this FAO Fisheries Report No. 291.
Most of the participants in this consultation were chosen because they are moving in directions which we thought will contribute and extend our abilities to measure, monitor and assess the impacts of system perturbations on resource populations. We can only lament the fact that we could not have included more of the front line fishery research community, but facilities and time were limiting. In any case we are certain that the fisheries community will appreciate the efforts that these contributions represent. We are quite content that we were able to facilitate this gathering as well as the timely publication and dissemination of the contributions.
Purpose and organization
The Expert Consultation to Examine Changes in Abundance and Species Composition of Neritic Fish Resources was held in San José, Costa Rica, from 18 to 29 April 1983 at the kind invitation of the Government of Costa Rica. In total 58 participants and 13 observers attended the consultation. The list of participants is attached.
The consultation was organized by FAO as part of the preparations for the FAO World Conference on Fisheries Management and Development and as a contribution to the Programme on Ocean Science in Relation to Living Resources adopted by the Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission (IOC).
The central theme of the consultation was the variability of neritic fish resources. The detailed objectives were:
- To document the changes that have occurred, in each region, in the environment, the abundance and distribution of fish populations, and in the fisheries, including societal and economic effects.
- To identify decision-makers' objectives and document now these are affected by changes in fish stocks.
- To provide an opportunity for comparison between regions, and to establish the similarities and differences, as a basis for improved understanding of the events in each individual region.
- To promote the inter-disciplinary study of the neritic systems, bringing together experts in the fields of oceanography and meteorology; basic biology; fishing industry; resource assessment and monitoring; and fishery management.
- To increase the understanding of the general processes involved in the dynamics of pelagic fisheries, which may lead to improved ability to predict significant changes in the system, hence to allow more time and options for the decision-making process.
- To provide a better scientific basis for the development of a management strategy which will take account of the best current knowledge, as well as the possibility of large-scale changes in the natural system.
The Expert Consultation took place in two phases. The first week was characterized by Symposium-type presentations. The technical secretaries opened the technical presentations by introducing the general topic of the neritic environment, the changes exhibited by living marine resources in these complex systems and the scientific and management problems that arise as fishery resources respond to the continuous barrage of environmental and biological changes, natural and man-induced.
Presentation and discussion of 53 background and review papers followed. These presentations were grouped into four sessions that covered:
(1) reviews of major neritic fish resources around the world where environmental and resource changes and related fishery responses were described;
(2) localized and comparative studies of environmental changes which included local studies as well as ocean scale and regional comparisons;
(3) review of impacts of environmental and resource variability on human communities; and
(4) application of methods and theory in fisheries and related fields.
Volumes 2 and 3 of this FAO Fisheries Report give a full account of the papers that were presented in the first week of the Expert Consultation.
A round table was also organized during the first week to hold informal discussions on objectives of fisheries management and decision-making processes. This informal session was chaired by M. H. Glantz and was formed comprising various interest groups available among the participants, i.e. industry scientists; international investment bank representatives; fishery managers; multinational fish buyer-processors; social scientists; and fisheries biologists. Short statements were made of the kinds of information each considered to be important to their specific decision-making. This produced a broader dialogue and emphasized some of the conflicts of interest characterizing the different factions involved in fishery decision-making.
Four Working Groups were set up during the second week, each one dealing with a particular subject on which a report was drafted. Sessions of Working Group No. 1 were chaired by Alec MacCall; this group discussed and drafted a report on resources study and monitoring. Sessions of Working Group No. 2 were chaired by Michael H. Glantz; this group discussed and drafted a report on societal and economical implications of varying fishery resources. Sessions of Working Group No. 3 were chaired by Andrew Bakun; this group discussed and drafted a report on environmental studies and monitoring. Sessions of Working Group No. 4 were chaired by Jorge Csirke; this group discussed and drafted a report on fisheries management, implications and interactions.
Results
Main results of this Expert Consultation are reflected by the reports of the four working groups. These reports constitute the Report of the Expert Consultation and are being published in the FAO Reports Series as FAO Fisheries Report No. 291, Volume 1.
The report of Working Group No. 1 on Resource Study and Monitoring sets up major guidelines to study and monitor variable fisheries resources, providing information which may be useful in evaluating needs and choosing among alternative methods and studies. The report also identifies major symptoms of adverse changes (and potential collapse) in resource status and discusses a variety of topics on monitoring of fishery operations and biological sampling.
The report of Working Group No. 2 on Societal and Economical Implications of Varying Fishery Resources identifies the different effects the variability of fisheries resources has on society, identifies different groups (at the individual, national and international level) that play a role in the decision-making process and those sectors that are more seriously affected by resources fluctuations. The report also discusses the way some fisheries had developed in the past, sources of problems related to fisheries management, the participation of fisheries scientists in the decision-making process, the problems that confront fisheries scientists in this process and suggests some remedies for dealing with such problems.
The report of Working Group No. 3 on Environmental Studies and Monitoring identifies the main "primary variables" or conditions which directly affect individual fish, and through these populations abundance. These primary variables (i.e. food, production, temperature, salinity and oxygen concentration) are altered by several processes, some of which are described in the report together with the different sources of information on environmental variability and biological characteristics. The report stresses the need for more rigorous approaches to the problem of environmental effects on fishery problems and makes some suggestions in this respect. It also underlines the value of having information on environmental variations for management purposes, particularly when environment has proven to be a major source of fluctuation of fish availability.
The report of Working Group No. 4 summarizes the results of the other three working groups as they apply to Fisheries Management. In this report it is recognized that variability in recruitment is the major immediate cause of the fluctuations in the neritic fish resources, which in most cases seems to be closely linked with changes in environmental conditions. However, it also recognizes that fishing has also played a major part in exaggerating these fluctuations and in precipitating the collapse of a number of pelagic fisheries. In highly variable resources the level of biomass or production cannot be regulated by varying fishing effort. However, because of the higher risks of collapse and the economic and societal costs involved, the needs for management are greater when dealing with these highly variable resources.
The traditional approach to fisheries management tends to concentrate on managing the resources and its fluctuations primarily by regulating timing and amount of fishing. Working Group No. 4, recognizing that variability is an inherent characteristic of many neritic fish populations, suggests that management efforts should be concentrated on managing fisheries and their fluctuations by following, or better, by anticipating resources fluctuations. The report stresses that when managing fisheries of highly variable resources one of the objectives is to not aggravate resource fluctuations, and to conduct the developments of the fishery in such a way as to maximize gains in periods of great abundance and minimize losses during periods of lowest abundance. A higher degree of flexibility needs to be introduced in the fleets, industries, factories, marketing processes, etc., in order to allow the fisheries sector to buffer the effects of the fluctuations and adapt quickly to possible changes of the resources.
These proceedings reflect the efforts and experiences of many people, all of whom have been or are involved directly or indirectly in fisheries and fishery related problems. This we think is the best indication of the relevance of this volume to future research requirements, future social and societal assessments and particularly to future management practices. We suggest that both these Proceedings and the Report of the consultation be considered as complementary to each other. They should be read and studied as such when trying to wheigh past, present and future management practices and procedures.
