This document has been prepared by the Marine Resources Service, Fishery Resources Division, FAO Fisheries Department. It is part of the regular programme activities and a partial fulfilment of the Organization's role with regards to the monitoring and reporting on global marine resources and relevant environmental and ecological changes (FAO Programme Element 232A4). The main objective of this review is to provide the FAO Committee on Fisheries (COFI) and more generally, policy-makers, civil society and those who derive their livelihood from fisheries and/or have a direct interest in the conservation and management of world fishery resources with a comprehensive, objective and global review of the state of the living marine resources of the oceans. This document updates the information provided in FAO Fisheries Circular No. 920, Review of the state of world marine fishery resources: marine fisheries, issued in 1997, and also updates and expands the information provided in relevant fishery resources sections of the more recent FAO publications on The state of world fisheries and aquaculture (SOFIA). It is intended that this Review of the state of world marine fishery resources will be completely revised every six years, with briefer updates provided biennially.
Relevant sections of this review have been compiled by FAO and selected invited experts, as indicated at the beginning of each chapter. J. Csirke was responsible for the general coordination and final technical editing of this document, with the valuable assistance of J.-J. Maguire and M. Lamboeuf. R.Coppola, F. Carocci and M. Spinelli assisted with the preparation of tables and illustrations, R.Sola assisted with the typing and proofreading of main sections and E. D'Antoni illustrated the front cover and made the climate change graphs. The authors and editors gratitude is expressed to the large number of readers, collaborators and external experts that offered comments, information and suggestions based on earlier versions of this review. In this respect, thanks are expressed to: A.Aguilar Ibarra (INP, México), Alaska Fisheries Science Center, D.L.Alverson (University of Washington, Seattle, Washington, USA), P. Arenas Fuentes (INP, Mexico), D.Arosemena (Panamá), G. Bianchi (Nansen Programme, Norway), D.S. Butterworth (Marine Resource Assessment and Management Group, University of Cape Town, South Africa), A.Cockcroft (Marine and Coastal Management, South Africa), J. Coetzee (Marine and Coastal Management, South Africa), G.D'Almeida (National Marine Information and Research Centre, Namibia), V. de Barros Neto (Instituto de Investigaçao Marinha, Angola), M.E. de Leon Gonzales (Centro de Investigaciones Pesqueras, Cuba), K. Dunlop (University of Washington, Seattle, Washington, USA), L. Fereira, (Fisheries Division, Trinidad and Tobago), M. Griffiths (Marine and Coastal Management, South Africa), R. Guevara (IMARPE, Callao, Peru), S.Holloway (Marine Resource Assessment and Management Group, Cape Town, South Africa), ICES (International Council for the Exploration of the Sea), T.Iilende (National Marine Information and Research Centre, Namibia), P. McConney (Caribbean Conservation Association), R. Leslie (Marine and Coastal Management, South Africa), P. Nichols (Ministry of Fisheries and Marine Resources, Namibia), H.Nion (INAPE/DINARA, Montevideo, Uruguay), North Pacific Fisheries Science Center, E. Plaganyi (Marine Resource Assessment and Management Group, University of Cape Town, South Africa), R.A. Rademeyer (Marine Resource Assessment and Management Group, University of Cape Town, South Africa), L.Reynal (IFREMER, Martinique), S.A. Saccardo (IBAMA, Sao Paulo, Brazil), J.C. Seijo (Centro Marista de Estudios Superiores, Mérida, Mexico), L.Spadafora (Panamá), S. Sugiyama (FAO RAPI Bangkok), L. Villegas (Valparaiso, Chile), C.Waluda (Natural Environment Research Council, Cambridge, UK), J. Xavier (Natural Environment Research Council, Cambridge, UK) and many others who with our regrets are not being listed. Nevertheless and while fully recognizing the assistance received from different sources, the full responsibility for what is presented in this review lies entirely on the Organization and the authors of each chapter.
It is noted that in order to avoid repetition and to simplify the numerous references to catch information, the use of the unit “tonnes” has been abbreviated to “t” immediately following the figure without space.
This document updates the regular reviews of the state of the worlds marine fisheries and fishery resources, based mainly on official catch statistics throughout 2002 and relevant stock assessment and other complementary information available until 2004. The introductory chapters refer to the global situation and major trends of world marine capture fish production and the state of the world marine fishery resources. More detailed information is provided for each FAO statistical area, together with a discussion of the major trends and changes that have occurred with the main fishery resources exploited in each area and comments on the stock assessment work undertaken in support of fisheries management in each region. Special sections address the global issue of tunas and tuna-like species and other high profile topics such as those dealing with world squid resources, deep-sea fisheries and long-term climate change and fisheries. Summary tables are provided for each statistical area showing historical and recent catches for the major marine resources and judgements on their most current state of exploitation.
FAO Marine Resources Service,
Fishery Resources Division.
Review of the state of world marine fishery resources.
FAO Fisheries Technical Paper . No. 457.
Rome, FAO. 2005. 235p.
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FAO Fisheries Officers in FAO Regional Offices
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