Have peak fishery production levels been passed in continental shelf areas? Some perspectives arising for historical trends in production per shelf

• Main Authors: J. F. Caddy, F. Carocci
• Other Authors: The Pennsylvania State University CiteSeerX Archives
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Published: 1998
• Subjects: Arctic; Antarctic; Antarc*
• Online Access: http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.568.3823; http://journal.nafo.int/J23/caddy.pdf

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