Elizabeth
Mendenhall, URI assistant professor of marine affairs, said that ocean warming,
acidification and sea level rise that are a direct result of climate change are
causing populations of fish to shift, making fish increasingly scarce, shifting
the boundaries of where nations can legally
“These
conflicts exist at multiple scales,” said Mendenhall, who is writing a book about
geopolitics and ocean governance. “Some of it is one boat versus another,
sometimes it’s one country versus another, and it can get very complicated. It
isn’t just about overfishing any more. There are other drivers and other
dynamics involved.”
As warming
temperatures shift fish populations to different areas, for instance, the bulk
of those stocks may cross the borders of a nations’ 200-mile exclusive economic
zone, making it illegal for those who have fished those stocks for many years
to pursue them any longer.
“We’re
seeing examples of fishermen crossing borders more often now because the stocks
they feel they have a right to have shifted across the border,” Mendenhall
said.
Among
the more challenging questions that climate change is raising for fishing
nations is what happens when sea level rise submerges an island. Does that
change the nation’s maritime boundaries?
“It’s
an ongoing debate about whether you keep your maritime claim even though you
have no land base to manage it from,” said Mendenhall. “Or does your claim go
away? There are a lot of nations that fish over long distances that are ready
to exploit those areas if national boundaries no longer exist.”
The
tiny Japanese atoll of Okinotorishima is one such case. Located in the southernmost
archipelago of Japan, its submergence is raising questions about whether Taiwan
and China may legally fish in the area claimed by Japan.
“I
argue that as sea level rises, Japan’s argument gets weaker,” said Mendenhall,
noting that the countries have not challenged the boundaries based on the
island’s submergence yet. “The rules on where you can make your maritime claim
are based on where the land is.
“The same problem applies to coastlines,” she added. “Low-lying
countries like Bangladesh and Vietnam could lose a lot of maritime territory as
sea level rises. The outer edge of their claim could move closer to their
coastline.”
The
research team makes a series of recommendations based on its findings designed
to improve global fishery management. They recommend greater multilateral
fishery monitoring, similar to what is in place off East Africa to combat
piracy, which can help deter or catch illegal fishers, thereby reducing the
chance that individual fishing boats will take matters into their own hands.
“We
also suggest that marine protected areas be used, but it’s critical that the
area protected is one where habitats are still thriving despite climate
change,” Mendenhall said. “There is concern, however, that when you protect one
area, it may displace the fishers to somewhere else and make the problem worse
elsewhere. We need to think about the dynamics that protected areas may cause
and account for that in the site selection process.”
Finally,
the researchers recommend strengthening the global fisheries management regime
by taking into account climate change and the new sources of fishery conflict.
The management boundaries of many fish stocks were drawn decades ago, and some
parts of the open ocean are not managed at all because no productive fish
stocks were there many years ago, yet there may be fish stocks there in the
future. Most importantly, they suggest that the regional fishery management
organizations work together to develop coordinated governance systems to better
manage fisheries as environmental conditions change and greater conflicts arise.
“These changes to how [regional
fishery management organizations] manage fisheries, and how they coordinate and
cooperate with one another, can make high seas fisheries management more
resilient to shifts in stocks and users, and changes in relative
abundance,” the researchers conclude.
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