Drivers of Global Fishery Development Patterns: Chasing Dollars throughout the Food Web

Successful ocean management need consider not only fishing impacts, but drivers of harvest.  Consolidating post-1950 global catch and economic data, we assessed which attributes of fisheries are good indicators for fishery development.  Surprisingly, year of development and economic value are not correlated with fishery trophic level.  Instead, patterns emerge of profit-driven fishing for attributes related to costs and revenues, regardless of position in ocean food webs.  Fisheries initially developed on shallow ranging species with large catch, high price, and big body size, and then expanded to less desirable species.  Revenues expected from developed fisheries declined 95% during 1951-1999.  Globally, industrialized fishing has been efficient at finding and developing opportunities, with most high-value opportunities already developed by 1980.  These results highlight the importance of economic attributes of species as leading indicators for harvest-related impacts in ocean ecosystems.