Making the Shift from Ideas to Action in West Coast Ecosystem-Based Fisheries Management

U.S. implementation of ecosystem-based fishery management (EBFM) is both supported and stymied by laws that address human interactions with ocean ecosystems.  Without the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act (MSA), we would not have the data to feed the ecological models that imagine EBFM.  However, the MSA and other laws also require that we focus sharply on the statuses of particular species, or on the welfare of particular fisheries and communities. 

The Pacific Fishery Management Council (Council) manages fisheries in U.S. waters off the coasts of Washington, Oregon, and California, and has adopted an “evolutionary, not revolutionary” approach to EBFM.  Through careful research and deliberation, and in cooperation with its array of constituents, the Council developed a Fishery Ecosystem Plan that takes advantage of emerging ecosystem science and existing legal pathways to EBFM.  The Council’s first EBFM action limits the types of fishing gear freely useable within the U.S. West Coast Exclusive Economic Zone and prohibits the future development of fisheries for currently unfished forage fish species.  For 2015-2016, the Council will take an in-depth look at ecosystem status indicators for the California Current Ecosystem and assess how new climate science could affect its fishery management policies.