Wild-Caught Fishing Factsheet
Background
Just under 50% of aquatic animals killed for food are wild-caught, while the rest are farmed (aquaculture). The list of aquatic animals targeted in wild-caught fishing is very broad and includes finfish, crustaceans, mollusks, pinnipeds, cephalopods, and cetaceans. The term “fishing” is used when discussing all of these animals.
Even though it is impossible to calculate exactly how many animals are caught each year, it is estimated that globally, between 2007 and 2016, 0.79 to 2.3 trillion fish were caught and killed annually. Global total marine catches reached 84.4 million tons in 2018. No other global sector removes a comparable volume of wild animals from any natural habitat on earth. This estimate does not include sport fishing, illegal, unreported, and unregulated captures, or animals killed by lost and discarded fishing gear, caught for use as feed, or who died after escaping from fishing gear. It also does not include animals who die as a result of pollution, ship strikes, lack of food, or other reasons. Because of the sheer staggering number of wild animals caught, their suffering is a major animal welfare concern, and their loss is an environmental disaster.
Overfishing
Aquatic animals are overfished when those remaining cannot reproduce quickly enough to sustain necessary numbers for survival. This, in turn, compromises the balance of the surrounding ecosystem. Overfishing is often associated with commercial wild-caught fishing companies that take massive amounts of fish and other aquatic animals.
The main commercial capture methods are:
- Purse Seine – A long wall of netting framed with a float line and lead line with purse rings hanging from the lower edge, through which runs a wire or rope purse line which allows pursing of the net.
- Bottom, Pelagic (Midwater), and Skimmer Trawls – Floats are attached to the top of the trawl opening, while weights and special gear are connected to the footrope, bottom of the trawl opening, to keep the net open as it moves through the water across the ocean floor, midwater, or top of water.
- Gillnet – Wall or curtain of netting that hangs in the water, which is practically invisible to fish. Mesh sizes allow fish to get only their head through the netting but not their body and the fish's gills get caught in the mesh as the fish tries to back out of the net. As the fish struggles to free itself, it becomes more and more entangled.
- Pound Net – Fence leader that interrupts the movements of target species and a heart that funnels fish into the trap (pound) via a mesh tunnel. The netting usually reaches above the waterline with the pound open at the surface.
- Traps and Pots – Stationary and typically made from wood, wire netting, or plastic, are used to catch crustaceans. All feature a cone-shaped entrance tunnel through which a crab or lobster is enticed with bait but cannot escape.
- Pelagic (Midwater) Longlines – A long line behind a boat that baited hooks are attached to with nets at intervals to attract the target species. The average U.S. longline set is 28 miles long.
- Demersal (Bottom) Longlines - Consists of a mainline weighted to the seafloor with buoy lines marked by flags on either end, called highflyers. Leaders with baited hooks, are attached to the mainline and a longline set which can have up to a thousand baited hooks.
- Pole and Line Fishing – Used to catch one fish at a time. Water is sprayed with baitfish, creating the illusion of an active school of prey fish. Fishers line up along the back of the vessel, each with a hand-held pole with a short line and hook.
- Dredging – A metal rake is dragged across the seafloor, scrapping or penetrating the bottom to collect target species.
- Fish Aggregating Devices (FADs) – Floating objects that are designed and placed to attract pelagic fish.
Bycatch
Fishing boats can also affect other species than those they seek to fish. This phenomenon is referred to as “bycatch,” which is the incidental capture of non-target species, including non-target fish, seabirds, marine mammals, and sea turtles – usually thrown back into the sea dead or dying. Bycatch is a concern with almost all fishing methods. Every year, approximately 9.1 million tons—or 10.8% of the global catch—is bycatch and discarded. That figure only applies to the legal and reported global catch. Numbers are not available for the amount of bycatch resulting from illegal, unreported, and unregulated operations.
Ghost gear
The detrimental animal and environmental effects of fishing persist long after fishing boats leave, as fishing boats often leave behind the equipment they use to capture the animals. Ghost gear refers to any fishing gear that has been abandoned, lost, or otherwise discarded. Countless aquatic species are killed annually by ghost gear. Fish, crabs, and lobsters often get caught in lost traps. Sea turtles, marine mammals, and seabirds get entangled in, or ingest, plastic fishing lines, causing them to starve or drown.
Aquaculture’s Impact on Wild-Caught Fishing
Aquaculture also raises welfare issues for wild-caught fish. The use of wild fish to feed farmed species places direct pressure on wild populations and wild-caught fishing resources. Every year, hundreds of billions of fish—almost one-fifth of the world’s annual wild catch—are dried, pressed, and ground into fish meal and fish oil (FMFO). FMFO is used especially for carnivorous fish, such as salmon and octopus.
Additionally, high stocking densities in aquaculture are conducive to disease outbreaks, which can spread to wild fish. In cage aquaculture, there is a constant interface between the captive fish and the outside waters, meaning that pathogens, including lice and other pests, can travel between captive and wild populations relatively unencumbered.
Another risk posed by aquaculture to wild fish is fish stocking, which is the practice of raising fish in hatcheries and releasing them into rivers, lakes, or the ocean. Fish stocking can cause loss of genetic diversity, transmission and introduction of infectious diseases and pathogens, the release of chemicals that are used in aquaculture facilities, and non-endemic stocked fish may out-compete, displace, or prey on native endemic species altering food web and community structure.
Aquaculture also affects the environment of wild fish. In open water aquaculture systems, the excess fish feed introduces extra nitrogen and phosphorous directly into the water, and in closed-off inland systems tend to dump effluent directly into natural waterways. Eutrophication of excessive nutrients creates dense algal blooms that reduce water clarity and harm water quality. Algal blooms lead to killing wild fish, seagrass, and habitats.
Key Considerations
When evaluating, drafting or comparing laws and policies related to the use of antimicrobials, local context, political feasibility and the regulatory environment all influence what one considers “Better Practice.” With that caveat in mind, the following considerations indicate better and worse practices for laws and policies seeking to regulate the fishing industry.
1. Recognition of the Sentience of Wild Aquatic Animals
Studies conclude that the perception and cognitive abilities of fish often match or exceed that of other vertebrate animals. A scientific consensus concludes that fish experience pain in a manner similar to other vertebrates.
A positive example of a law recognizing the sentience of animals, including aquatic animals, is Article 13 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union, which recognizes all animals as sentient beings, and requires the EU and Member States to take into account their welfare, including in fisheries policies. The UK Animal Welfare (Sentience) Bill is legislation proposed by the Government of the United Kingdom, that among other things will also recognize animal sentience and will include fish, cephalopod molluscs, and decapod crustaceans in recognition of their sentience and ability to feel pain.
2. Animal Welfare Standards
Fish are excluded from any protections offered to terrestrial animals slaughtered for human consumption. The catching and slaughtering of wild caught fish in particular, is largely under-regulated. Fish and other aquatic animals are excluded from most laws that protect animals: many criminal state anti-cruelty laws, slaughter laws, transportation laws, and research and captive animal laws. The US Humane Methods of Slaughter Act requires that some animals be rendered insensible to pain before being slaughtered. The Act applies to farmed land animals (but not birds) and does not apply to fish. The EU Slaughter Regulation 1099/2009 includes fish in its scope but excludes them from virtually all the provisions in the act.
As a result, most wild-caught fish are left to suffocate in the air as they try to escape while their gills collapse, preventing them from breathing. Another choice is evisceration, in which the fish’s internal organs are removed, excluding the brain and gills. This is usually done without prior stunning. Sometimes fish are put into ice water in a process called chilling. Chilling is extremely stressful for fish and may lead the fish to try to violently escape and may also cause them to suffer for a longer time, up to hours at a time. Tuna, swordfish, and other larger animals are often clubbed to death leading the animals to lose and regain consciousness causing the process to have to be repeated several times.
The World Organization for Animal Health (OIE), an intergovernmental agency that sets minimum (though non-enforceable) animal welfare standards for member nations, published recommendations on fish slaughter in 2015. Chapter 7.3, Welfare Aspects of Stunning and Killing of Farmed Fish for Human Consumption, lays out general principles to ensure the welfare of fish for stunning, killing, and transportation. These general principles include training requirements of fish staff handling fish, the use of appropriate species-specific killing devices, and effective stunning of fish prior to their bleeding.
3. Provisions to Reduce Bycatch
3.1. Species Protection Provisions
Species-specific protection acts are those that focus on protecting a single species rather than a category ofr animals or a broad habitat. These acts are narrowly written to protect a certain group of animals, but that protection may also have beneficial impacts on the other animals who interact or rely on the protected species. Protecting a species may reduce overall fishing in a particular part of the ocean offering some relief for nearby animals. Additionally, protecting a species benefits the ecological stability of a region and thereby helps other animals.
A bill in Hawai’i, United States, passed by the 2021 State Legislature banning shark fishing took effect on January 1, 2022. Act 51 makes it illegal to knowingly capture, entangle, or kill a shark in state marine waters. The new law applies to all shark species found in Hawaiian waters. This bill does carve out exceptions for people with permits, public safety purposes, and self-defence or defence of another. This act is a good example of species-specific protection, though it does not address bycatch.
3.2. More Selective Catching Methods
New technology aimed to reduce bycatch includes turtle excluder devices, metallic repellents (used to repel sharks and rays), trap net modifications, artificial illumination (may decrease bycatch of endangered chinook salmon), and revival boxes. However, very few laws require the use of such methods.
A positive example of a law requiring the use of more selective methods can be found in the US regulation on Sea Turtle Conservation; Shrimp Trawling Requirements, (50 CFR Parts 223). This rule requiring the use of selective catching methods that include imposing regulations on US shrimp trawlers operating in the US waters of the Gulf of Mexico and South Atlantic to equip their trawls with a turtle excluder devices (TEDs).
Other examples include the EU Habitats Directive and US Endangered Species Act, which both aim to protect the most endangered and vulnerable species, in their respective jurisdictions, including aquatic animals by requiring implementation of specific management plans for endangered and vulnerable species. The EU Birds Directive further prohibit the use of non-selective fishing methods, given their impacts on birds and marine wildlife. Similarly, the US Marine Mammal Protection Act establishes a national policy to prevent marine mammal species from declining beyond the point where they cease to be significant functioning elements of the ecosystems of which they are a part.
3.3. Landing Obligation
Landing obligations make it mandatory for fishing boats to keep all animals caught during fishing activities, and thus banning the discarding of dead, unwanted animals in the sea. Landing obligations aims to ensuring the reporting of each fish caught, or landed, and to eliminate discards by encouraging fishers to fish more selectively and to avoid unwanted catches.
A positive legislation on landing obligations can be found in EU law, which requires all catch limit species be landed and counted against the fishers’ quotas. Undersized fish caught and landed should not be used for direct human consumption, but for products such as pet food, fish meal, pharmaceuticals, and food supplements.
Additional legislation imposing landing requirements include the regulations prohibiting discards of cod and haddock in Norway's economic zone off the Norwegian mainland. In 1987, Norway introduced a ban on discards. The general rule is that the economic value of the fish caught in violation of the regulations is forfeited to the state. As such, where vessel quotas or bycatch limits are exceeded, fishermen may decide it is better to discard the illegal fish rather than landing it. As an attempt to counter such behaviour, fishermen retain 20% of the forfeited sum of money if it is established that the illegal catch was taken unintentionally. However, this policy only applies to the whitefish sector.
4. Conservation Policy Goals
In 2015, United Nations’ Member States adopted seventeen Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) that set out specific objectives for countries to meet within a given time frame. SDG 14 establishes the goal to “conserve and sustainably use the oceans, seas and marine resources.” The U.N. established targets are formulated in anthropocentric terms, meaning that they are to be achieved for the benefit of humans. SDG 14 directly relates to aquatic animals and should include goals that pertain to their welfare as well. Improved methods of catching wild fish will improve their welfare and reduce bycatch.
Nearly every country in the world has agreed to a goal of protecting at least 10% of the world’s coastal and marine areas by 2020. As of June 2020, Marine Protected Areas that prohibit commercial fishing account for 23% of US waters. Only 3% of US waters are highly protected, prohibiting all extractive uses (or “no take”). Most MPAs restrict or prohibit harmful extraction uses to some degree, but not entirely and enforcement is problematic. Overall, marine protected areas, when enforced, do appear to help fish recover but only within their boundaries.
The Central Arctic Ocean Fisheries Agreement also created important commitments. First, the parties have agreed not to authorize commercial fishing operations in the large portion of the Central Arctic Ocean for a period of time. Second, the Agreement creates a “Joint Program of Scientific Research and Monitoring for the Central Arctic Ocean,” with the aim of improving understanding of the ecosystems of the Agreement Area. Third, it requires the inclusion of indigenous voices and knowledge. The Agreement is a preventative measure because no commercial fishing has taken place in this area yet, uniquely employing the precautionary principle.
References
References
Aquatic Animal Alliance, Animal Welfare Considerations for Marine Stewardship Council’s 2020 – 2021 Standards Review (2021).
Luke T. Barrett et. al, Impacts of Marine and Freshwater Aquaculture on Wildlife: A Global Meta-Analysis, Review in Aquaculture (2019).
Jonathan Birch et. al, Review of the Evidence of Sentience in Cephalopod Molluscs and Decapod Crustaceans, The London School of Economics and Political Science (2021).
Culum Brown, Fish Intelligence, Sentience and Ethics, Animal Cognition (2015).
Changing Market Foundation and Compassion in World Farming, Until the Seas Run Dry: How Industrial Agriculture is Plundering the Oceans (2019).
FAO; The State of World Fisheries and Aquaculture: Sustainability in Action (2020).
NOAA Fisheries, Understanding Area-based Management in U.S. Waters
Nathan Pacoureau et. al, Half a Century of Global Decline in Oceanic Sharks and Rays, Nature (2021).
Further Readings
Aquatic Animal Institute, Benefits of Aquatic Animal Welfare for Sustainability (2021).
Compassion in World Farming, Why Fish Welfare Matters: The Evidence for Fish Sentience (2019).
Environmental Investigation Agency, Commercial Whaling: Unsustainable, Inhumane, Unnecessary (2018).
Peter Gullestad et al.,The “Discard Ban Package”: Experiences in Efforts to Improve the Exploitation Patterns in Norwegian Fisheries, Marine Policy (2015).
Karly Kelso and Nicole Sarto, Eliminating Discards, Environmental Defense Fund (2018).
A. Mood and P. Brooke, Towards a Straetgy for Humane Fishing in the UK, Fish Count (2019).
Author: Jessica Dantzler, Student, Animal Law Clinic, Lewis & Clark Law School
Supervisor: Kathy Hessler
Law / Policy Name of the text | Topic The topic of the legislation or policy covered by the text | Species The animal, or type of food production, covered by the text | Type of Act Whether the act is a law, regulation, or policy, or another type of text | Status Indicates whether the act is in force or not |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| AgricultureAnimal healthAnimal welfare | All animals | Legislation | In force | |
| Animal healthAnimal welfareAntimicrobial resistance | Farmed animals | Legislative Proposal | Bill proposal | |
28-Hour Law USA | Animal welfare | Farmed animals | Legislation | In force |
| Alternative ProteinsPublic procurement | Farmed animals | Legislative Proposal | Bill proposal | |
| AgricultureAnimal healthAntimicrobial resistance | Farmed animals | Policy | In force | |
| Animal healthAnimal welfareWild-caught fishing | Fish | International Convention | In force | |
| AgricultureAnimal welfareClimate & environmental protection | Farmed animals | Legislative Proposal | In force | |
| Animal welfare | All animals | Constitution | In force | |
| Animal welfareRecognition of sentience | All animals | Legislation | In force | |
| Animal welfare | All animals | Constitution | In force | |
| Recognition of sentience | All animals | Legislation | In force | |
| Animal welfare | All animals | Constitution | In force | |
Article 80 of the Swiss Constitution Switzerland | Animal welfare | All animals | Constitution | In force |
| Animal welfareAquacultureRecognition of sentience | Farmed animalsFish | Legislation | In force | |
| AgricultureAnimal healthAntimicrobial resistance | All animals | Legislation | In force | |
| Recognition of sentience | All animals | Legislation | In force | |
| AgricultureAnimal welfare | Broiler chickens | Legislation | In force | |
| AgricultureAnimal healthAnimal welfareSales Bans | CalvesPigs | Legislation | In force | |
| AgricultureAnimal welfare | Calves | Legislation | In force | |
Canada 2020 NDC Canada | Climate & environmental protection | Farmed animals | Policy | In force |
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