The effects of climate change are hindering the ability of the world to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) by 2030. In particular, the success of SDG 2 (Zero hunger) is threatened by the impacts of climate change on global food production, leaving over 20% of the world's population at risk of food and nutrition insecurity. Fisheries, particularly small-scale fisheries (SSF), play a crucial role in future global food security. With the constant increase in demand for aquatic food products and its key role in nutrition in many coastal contexts, sustainable fishery production is essential to ensure healthy food while protecting the health and function of marine ecosystems. Despite its importance for livelihoods and nutrition for millions of people, SSFs remain poorly acknowledged in global policies. Social-ecological relationships in SSF are complex and poorly understood, making it difficult to formulate policies that could improve and preserve the contributions of SSF to sustainable development. Here, we developed an expert-based rapid appraisal framework to identify and characterize the contribution of SSF to SDGs. We implemented a flexible scoring system for data-limited situations, usable with natural resources users, managers, and scientists. Our structured approach is not limited to SDG 14 and target 14.b; rather, it provides insights into SSF's contributions to 11 other SDGs. This research discusses the findings from the application of the Rapid Appraisal framework to 60 SSF case studies in eight countries across Africa, Europe, and Latin America. Our findings indicate that SSF have consistent potential to advance certain SDGs and targets, especially targets 1.4, 12.3, 1.1, 8.5, and to a lesser extent targets 14.2, 14.1, and 16.7. SSFs impact on other targets are variable and dependent on local contexts, especially some targets of SDGs 5 (targets 5.5 and 5.A) and 8 (targets 8.7, 8.8, and 8.9). Our work reveals that unlocking SSFs potential to advance SDGs, requires understanding them not only from the marine resource perspective (SDG 14) but also from its social and economic components. Our study provides the first comprehensive approach for assessing the multiple contributions of SSFs to SDGs, allowing for a global assessment of SSF across diverse contexts, and analyzing key trends and variations in their contributions to the SDGs. As SSFs supply about 40% of the global fish catch and 90% of the employment in the capture fisheries sector, we argue that SSFs play a critical role in policies leading towards the SDGs.

Grey seals (Halichoerus grypus) feeding on fishery catches, a behavior termed “depredation”, is a major socio-economic and environmental issue in many regions of the north Atlantic. In northern Brittany, seals depredating on monkfish in static nets (gillnet and trammel net) is increasingly reported as problematic, but the issue has yet to be assessed and understood. In this study, we monitored 795 net sets between 2016 and 2018 to i) quantify the frequency of depredation events and the amount of depredated fish and ii) identify the drivers influencing variation in these two metrics. We found that during this period, seal depredation occurred on 18.5% of the net sets and resulted in the removal of 5.3% of the total number of monkfish catches. From statistical models, our results suggested that the probability of seal depredation to occur was higher near haulout sites, in shallower water. However, when depredation occurred, the amount of fish depredated was higher in gillnets than in trammel nets, in longer nets, and nets set further from haulout sites. As seal depredation is likely to escalate with the increase of local grey seal populations, our results provide insights on how fishers may adjust their practices to reduce depredation in northern Britanny and other fisheries facing a similar issue.

Tuna Regional Fishery Management Organizations (tRFMOs) are increasingly interested in spatiotemporal management as a tool to reduce interaction rates with vulnerable species. We use blue shark ( Prionace glauca ) as a case study to demonstrate the critical first steps in the implementation process, highlighting how predictions of global habitat for vulnerable life stages can be transformed into a publicly -accessible spatial bycatch mitigation tool. By providing examples of possible management goals and an associated threshold to identify essential habitats, we show how these key areas can represent a relatively low percentage of oceanic area on a monthly basis (16-24% between 50 degrees S and 60 degrees N), yet can have relatively high potential protection efficiency (similar to 42%) for vulnerable stages if fishing effort is redistributed elsewhere. While spatiotemporal management has demonstrable potential for blue sharks to effectively mitigate fishing mortality on sensitive life stages, we identify inherent challenges and sequential steps that require careful consideration by tRFMOs as work proceeds. We also discuss how our single-species framework could be easily extended to a multispecies approach by assigning relative conservation risk before layering habitat model predictions in an integrated analysis. Such broader application of our approach could address the goals of tRFMOs related to reducing the ecosystem effects of fishing and pave the way for efficient fisheries co-management using an ecosystem-based approach.

The development of an ecosystem approach to fisheries management makes the assessment of the sustainability performance of fisheries a priority. This study examines European tropical tuna purse seine fleets as a case study, employing a multidisciplinary dashboard approach to evaluate historical and current sustainability performances. The aim is to enhance comprehension of the interconnected dimensions of sustainability and pinpoint management policy priorities.Using 18 indicators, we assessed the environmental, economic and social sustainability performances of European tropical tuna purse seine fleets, comparing them with other industrial tropical tuna fishing fleets in the Atlantic and Indian Oceans. The analysis also explored the temporal trend of sustainability performance for European tuna purse seiners from 2009 to 2019.Our results suggest that, compared with gillnetters and longliners, purse seiners and baitboats have a greater species-based selectivity, thereby catching fewer endangered, threatened or protected species, but a lower mature tuna catch rate, thus capturing more juveniles. We identify likely gaps in bycatch data reported by fishing on fish aggregating devices (FADs), due to results regarding selectivity and discard rates that appear inconsistent in the light of the scientific literature.The greater use of FADs, likely caused by the global tuna market, by purse seiner seems result in decreased ecological performances, as suggested by an increased carbon footprint per tonne landed. At the same time, it implies a better economic performance on the short-term, with higher net profit, energy efficiency (fuel consumed relative to monetary value created) and catch. For our case study, Ecology and Economy might seem to be in conflict for short-term perspective. However, consideration of the long-term impacts of FAD fishing and market incentives for fishing on free schools should lead purse seiner fleets to reduce drifting FAD fishing and promote more sustainable fishing practices.

En dehors des aires marines protégées, il n’existe pratiquement plus sur notre planète d’espace aquatique ne faisant l’objet d’une quelconque activité de pêche, qu’elle soit récréative ou professionnelle, artisanale ou industrielle.De la pêche, nous connaissons les captures commerciales. Moins connus sont les rejets, trop souvent morts, provenant de captures accidentelles qui ne termineront pas dans nos assiettes. Ce véritable gâchis est une face invisible de la pêche.Les dessins naturalistes présentés ici témoignent de ces poissons et mammifères marins capturés par erreur. Chaque aquarelle, donnant à voir la beauté du vivant, est accompagnée d’informations précises pour mieux découvrir ces espèces.En contribuant à rendre visible le non-visible, ce livre intéressera tout autant les passionnés de la mer ou de pêche, les amoureux de l’histoire naturelle ou les citoyens simplement désireux de nourrir leurs actes de consommation d’une éthique pour l’environnement.