Trends in use and prospects for the future harvest of world fisheries resources

Abstract Estimates of the potential yield from the marine environment have varied between 20–1000 million metric tons because they were based on poor and incomplete data and differing approaches to trophic level evaluation. The data is improving slightly and the estimates are beginning to agree with...

Full description

Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of the American Oil Chemists' Society
Main Authors: Sprague, Lucian M., Arnold, John H.
Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
Language:English
Published: Wiley 1972
Subjects:
Online Access:http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/bf02582476
https://api.wiley.com/onlinelibrary/tdm/v1/articles/10.1007%2FBF02582476
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1007/BF02582476
Description
Summary:Abstract Estimates of the potential yield from the marine environment have varied between 20–1000 million metric tons because they were based on poor and incomplete data and differing approaches to trophic level evaluation. The data is improving slightly and the estimates are beginning to agree within half an order of magnitude. We believe that the yield of marine fisheries could ultimately be expanded to ca. 400 million metric tons, by utilizing presently known but underutilized resources, by opening new fisheries in areas like the Indian Ocean and Antarctic and by improving systems of regulating the catch and fishing effort. In order to meet the maximum potential of the marine environment we will have to harvest at a lower trophic level in the food chain because most fish in higher trophic levels are being harvested at their maximum sustainable yield. This increasing harvest of smaller fish, plus the increasing demand for fishmeal for animal feed will cause an increasing proportion of the fish harvested to be used for reduction to fishmeal and oil.