2 research outputs found
Southward re-distribution of tropical tuna fisheries activity can be explained by technological and management change
There is broad evidence of climate change causing shifts in fish distribution worldwide, but less is known about the response of fisheries to these changes. Responses to climate-driven shifts in a fishery may be constrained by existing management or institutional arrangements and technological settings. In order to understand how fisheries are responding to ocean warming, we investigate purse seine fleets targeting tropical tunas in the east Atlantic Ocean using effort and sea surface temperature anomaly (SSTA) data from 1991 to 2017. An analysis of the spatial change in effort using a centre of gravity approach and empirical orthogonal functions is used to assess the spatiotemporal changes in effort anomalies and investigate links to SSTA. Both analyses indicate that effort shifts southward from the equator, while no clear pattern is seen northward from the equator. Random forest models show that while technology and institutional settings better explain total effort, SSTA is playing a role when explaining the spatiotemporal changes of effort, together with management and international agreements. These results show the potential of management to minimize the impacts of climate change on fisheries activity. Our results provide guidance for improved understanding about how climate, management and governance interact in tropical tuna fisheries, with methods that are replicable and transferable. Future actions should take into account all these elements in order to plan successful adaptation. © 2020 The Authors. Fish and Fisheries published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.This research is supported by the project CLOCK, under the European
Horizon 2020 Program, ERC Starting Grant Agreement nº679812
funded by the European Research Council. It is also supported by the
Basque Government through the BERC 2018-2021 programme and
by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness MINECO
through the BC3 María de Maeztu excellence accreditation MDM-
2017-0714. We thank, without implicating, C. Palma for his helpful
advice on the ICCAT database and M. Gabantxo and H. Gabantxo for
their knowledge transfer about tropical tuna fisheries. Also, we thank
I. Arostegui for her comments during the design of the random forest;
F. Saborido, A. Tidd and H. Arrizabalaga for scientific advice and
H. Murua and M. Ortiz for providing ICCAT data. Elena Ojea thanks
the Xunta the Galicia GAIN Oportunius programme and Consellería
de Educación (Galicia, Spain) for additional financial support
Southward re‐distribution of tropical tuna fisheries activity can be explained by technological and management change
There is broad evidence of climate change causing shifts in fish distribution worldwide, but less is known about the response of fisheries to these changes. Responses to climate‐driven shifts in a fishery may be constrained by existing management or institutional arrangements and technological settings. In order to understand how fisheries are responding to ocean warming, we investigate purse seine fleets targeting tropical tunas in the east Atlantic Ocean using effort and sea surface temperature anomaly (SSTA) data from 1991 to 2017. An analysis of the spatial change in effort using a centre of gravity approach and empirical orthogonal functions is used to assess the spatiotemporal changes in effort anomalies and investigate links to SSTA. Both analyses indicate that effort shifts southward from the equator, while no clear pattern is seen northward from the equator. Random forest models show that while technology and institutional settings better explain total effort, SSTA is playing a role when explaining the spatiotemporal changes of effort, together with management and international agreements. These results show the potential of management to minimize the impacts of climate change on fisheries activity. Our results provide guidance for improved understanding about how climate, management and governance interact in tropical tuna fisheries, with methods that are replicable and transferable. Future actions should take into account all these elements in order to plan successful adaptation.Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad|Ref. MDM-2017-0714Eusko Jaurlaritza|Ref. BERC 2018-202