The State of World Fisheries and Aquaculture 2020

Review of the 
State of World Marine Fishery Resources
(FAO, 2011).
20
The data series on the value added of fisheries and aquaculture, 
and GDP, integrate data from National Accounts Official Country Data 
(provided by the United Nations Statistics Division) and the Annual 
National Accounts Database of the Organisation for Economic 
Co-operation and Development.
21
As such, the quantity of production of marine capture fisheries is 
used as a proxy for the value of marine capture fisheries.
| 137 |

---

PART 2 
SUSTAINABILITY IN ACTION
Mathematically, the contribution of sustainable 
marine capture fisheries to a country’s GDP is 
calculated as follows:
𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑆
&
= ( 𝑆𝑆
)
𝑄𝑄
)
𝑄𝑄
+
,
)-.
× 0
𝑄𝑄
1
𝑄𝑄
2
×
𝑉𝑉𝑉𝑉
&56
𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑆 7
SuGDP
F
:
 
GDP from sustainable marine 
capture fisheries; 
S
i
: average sustainability published periodically 
for FAO major marine fishing area 
i
;
Q
i
: quantity fished from FAO major marine 
fishing area 
i
;
Q
N
: total quantity fished from FAO major 
marine fishing areas;
Q
M
: quantity of marine capture fisheries;
Q
T
: total quantity of fish;
VA
FIA
: value added fisheries and aquaculture;
GDP
: national GDP.
An indicator monitoring the economic 
contribution of sustainable fisheries promotes 
the real importance of fisheries in the national 
economy of countries, supporting a more balanced 
allocation of resources that may benefit the sector. 
The current framework established by FAO 
for SDG Indicator 14.7.1 can provide a robust 
and internationally applicable measure for the 
economic contribution of sustainable marine 
capture fisheries. It provides policymakers 
and the public at large with an analysis 
interconnecting the sector with the main pillars 
of the SDGs and promoting the sustainable use of 
the resources and sustainable economic activities.
The most recent data available for 
SDG Indicator 14.7.1 show that, for many regions 
of the world, the share of sustainable fisheries 
has been increasing, associated with improved 
fisheries management policies. Least developed 
countries and SIDS have been reporting steady 
contributions of sustainable fisheries to their GDP 
since 2011. 
n
FISHERIES AND 
AQUACULTURE 
SUSTAINABILITY
IN CONTEXT
Mainstreaming biodiversity in fisheries
and aquaculture
Why mainstream biodiversity in the fisheries
and aquaculture sector
Biological diversity, also called biodiversity, 
is the variability of life forms at all levels of 
biological systems – from the ecosystem down 
to the molecular level. Marine and freshwater 
biodiversity directly and indirectly supports 
food security, nutrition and livelihoods that 
are essential for millions of people around the 
world (FAO, 2018a). Importantly, it provides 
a primary source of essential nutrients for 
poorer communities (see the section Fish in 
food systems, p. 155). Maintaining the health of 
aquatic ecosystems is vital in order to meet the 
nutritional needs of a growing global population 
in a sustainable way. 
Capture fisheries are unique food production 
systems, as they are the only large-scale food 
sector that relies fully on wild biodiversity. 
In addition, species are harvested with 
minimal physical or chemical modification 
of the ecosystem. Despite fisheries and 
aquaculture not being reliant on wholescale 
environmental change, fished species depend 
on, or support, a number of other species 
and habitats, as components of complex 
human–natural systems. 
By its very nature, fishing activity affects the 
abundance of targeted fish populations and 
can have impacts on the status of associated 
or dependent species. The unsustainable use 
of fisheries resources damages their capacity 
for self-renewal and comes at the expense of 
ecosystem health and biodiversity conservation 
(
Box 18
). Overfishing
,
pollution, habitat destruction 
and heat-related climate change events, 
among other anthropogenic pressures, put at 
risk prospects for food security and nutrition, 
and resilient livelihoods in the longer term – 
| 138 |

---

THE STATE OF WORLD FISHERIES AND AQUACULTURE 
2020
ecosystem services can be valued at more than the 
equivalent annual global domestic product of the 
world’s economies (Costanza 
et al
., 2017).
In fisheries and aquaculture, the consideration 
of the impacts of harvests and culture of fish 
on natural environments has been increasing 
over time. This has resulted in more broadly 
focused, science-based governance approaches 
that have evolved and expanded the concept of 
natural resource management to include more 
integrated operational paradigms – management 
that recognizes biodiversity as indispensable 
for sustainable production (Friedman, 
Garcia and Rice, 2018; Brugère 
et al
., 2018). 
This consideration of biodiversity in fisheries and 
aquaculture management is being progressively 
and interactively implemented across national, 
»
At the heart of a fishery manager’s task is the 
maintaining of sustainable production, cognizant 
that fish are a renewable but not infinite resource. 
Although there is no record of a fully marine vertebrate 
fish species going extinct because of fishing, 
synergistic pressures from fishing and a range of 
other pressures have resulted in losses of fish from 
freshwater and brackish-water systems. 
Fishery managers need to consider risk as part of a 
precautionary approach, recognizing uncertainty in 
both the accuracy of available information and 
estimates of future conditions. This entails considering 
both the likelihood and consequence of known threats. 
A full range of qualitative and quantitative 
methodologies exists for risk assessment, a practice that 
benefits from broad stakeholder engagement.
1
Fishery managers respond to the challenge of 
achieving maximum production without putting stocks 
at unacceptable risk through knowing: the inherent 
vulnerability of the species; the stocks’ status; and how 
a species could respond to threats. In the absence of 
scientific evidence, they need to take a precautionary 
approach in order to avoid doing irreversible harm. 
Unlike for non-renewable resources, detrimental 
impacts in fisheries are mostly apparent well before 
irretrievable change occurs. In addition, documented 
experience exists on critical reference points that define 
the limit of fishing and the management responses 
needed to “rebuild” stocks.
2
The biodiversity conservation sector has adopted 
frameworks to describe the risk of fish extinction. Both 
the International Union for Conservation of Nature and 
the Convention on International Trade in Endangered 
Species of Wild Fauna and Flora have criteria to 
describe extinction risk. These risk-based approaches, 
as sustainability measures in fisheries, are often 
integral to countries’ governance frameworks. 
Risk-based approaches are increasingly informing 
decision-making across the management of the 
freshwater and marine realms,
3
reflecting greater 
sophistication in a general evolution under way since 
the mid-twentieth century from growing the catch to 
becoming more centred on management and 
conservation.
2
Their judicious use provides checks and 
balances to help to ensure fishing and trade are 
conducted sustainably and irretrievable impacts 
prevented or minimized. 
BOX 18
DETERMINING RISK AND MANAGEMENT NEEDS FOR VULNERABLE RESOURCES IN MARINE SYSTEMS
1
Cotter, J., Lart, W., de Rozarieux, N., Kingston, A., Caslake, R., Le Quesne, W., Jennings, S., Caveen, A. & Brown, M. 2015. A development of ecological risk screening with an applica-
tion to fisheries off SW England.