Have peak fishery production levels been passed in continental shelf areas? Some perspectives arising for historical trends in production per shelf
Trends in landings from global shelf areas (excluding the Arctic/Antarctic) for 1950– 94 are expressed per shelf surface of FAO Statistical Areas in four categories: "shelf-dependent " species (demersal fish plus commercial benthic invertebrates), "shelf-associ-ated " species (sm...
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| Format: | Text |
| Language: | English |
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1998
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| Online Access: | http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.568.3823 http://journal.nafo.int/J23/caddy.pdf |
| Summary: | Trends in landings from global shelf areas (excluding the Arctic/Antarctic) for 1950– 94 are expressed per shelf surface of FAO Statistical Areas in four categories: "shelf-dependent " species (demersal fish plus commercial benthic invertebrates), "shelf-associ-ated " species (small-medium sized pelagics and neritic squids), and "deep-water " and "oce-anic " species; largely focusing on the first two categories. Geographical variation for shelf-dependent resources is explained by dividing FAO Statistical Areas into three categories: Arcto-boreal regions in the northern hemisphere, with five-year mean fishery production peaking at 2.1–2.7 tons per km2; from the Antarc-tic convergence to south-boreal latitudes, with production peaking at 0.5–2.2 tons per km2, and tropical/subtropical shelves, peaking at 0.4–0.9 tons per km2 (except for the Central East Atlantic). For zoogeographically similar areas, overall production levels for shelf-dependent resources have generally reached similar peak values and declined re-cently in areas with long histories of fishing. For several areas, especially in the tropics, production peaked in the last five-year period considered, 1990–94, but further potential |
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