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Editor’s note: The COVID-19 pandemic is dramatically affecting the lives of many, if not most, of Skimmer readers right now, and it may herald some broad societal changes in the coming years. For the next few months, The Skimmer will take a look at the various ways that the pandemic is affecting marine ecosystems and their conservation and management. We will do this in installments published every 1-2 weeks. In this issue, we take a look at how fisheries and aquaculture are being affected by the pandemic. We will update previous installments of our coverage, so if you see critical aspects that we are missing, please let us know at skimmer [at] octogroup.org (). Many thanks to the EBM Tools Network for some early tips on what was happening at the docks.

“The biggest crisis to hit the fishing industry ever”

• Fisheries and their attendant industries and communities across the globe – ranging from European to UK to South African to Indonesian to North American – are being devastated by problems starting fishing voyages, decreases in demand from large-scale buyers – particularly restaurants, and the shutdown of exports to Asia – particularly China. The head of the Pacific Coast Federation of Fishermen’s Associations called the COVID-19 pandemic “the biggest crisis to hit the fishing industry ever.”
   
  • In some countries, fishing vessels are stuck in port due to measures intended to decrease the spread of COVID-19, while in others countries, lack of demand for product, border closings, and trouble gathering crews and supplies are keeping fishers at home. Satellite data suggest that fishing activity has decreased dramatically – as much as 80 percent – in China and West Africa. Offshore fleets that can spend extended periods of time at sea because they can process and freeze fish at sea and/or offload catch to transshipment vessels seem to be maintaining effort, however.
     
  • Sales and prices for premium seafood products that are generally sold to restaurants – such as lobster, crabs, scallops, and wild salmon – have been hit particularly hard. US Maine lobster, which would normally sell for $10 a pound (boat price) at this time of year, is currently selling for under $3 a pound.
     
  • Many grocery stores have shut down their fish counters and are only selling the most popular, prepackaged seafood items to make restocking easier and satisfy demand for less perishable products. Fishing groups are starting to explore ways to increase direct sales of fresh seafood to consumers, but current direct-sale markets and supply lines are insufficient to deal with the mass quantities of fresh seafood that are now available.
     
  • Pandemic stories from the fisheries sector highlight the intense globalization and complexity of the seafood trade. Many countries, such as the UK, Canada, and the US export most of the catch from their domestic fisheries while importing most of the seafood that their residents eat. (Some catch is exported to take advantage of lower labor costs for processing fish and then reimported.) These complicated trade patterns are a massive liability to the industry as the pandemic shuts down normal trade routes.
     
  • Even as nations start to relax measures to prevent the spread of COVID-19 and open businesses and industries, safety concerns may continue to dog the seafood sector. Fishing vessels and crowded seafood processing facilities do not easily allow for physical distancing, and both commercial and recreational fisheries are potential vectors of COVID-19 to remote communities.
     
• As with other environmental issues, the impacts of the pandemic on fisheries depend on local circumstances. Some Kenyan fishers are experiencing a temporary boost in sales and prices as local buyers switch from frozen Chinese fillet imports to local catch from Lake Victoria. This boom is unlikely to be long-term, however, because Kenya typically only produces a third of the fish that it consumes, relying on China for much of the difference. Restrictions on imports from China may soon lead to more widespread protein shortages for the country.
   
  • Similar shortages of aquatic foods and increases in prices are likely to occur in many other areas, harming poor consumers who depend on seafood for protein and essential micronutrients.
     
  • And, in general, already vulnerable and marginalized small-scale fishers and the industries and communities that depend on them (e.g., fish vendors and fish processors) are likely be devastated by the pandemic as their access to coastal areas is restricted and fish markets are affected by shutdowns. There is relatively little news coverage of the impact of the pandemic on small-scale fishers, and Too Big To Ignore (a global research partnership) and the Ocean Frontier Institute are currently working to document how the pandemic is affecting small-scale fishers.
     
• The extent of the COVID-19 pandemic on recreational fisheries is not yet clear, but some recreational fisheries, including all recreational fisheries in the Mediterranean, have been closed.
   
• For some fisheries, decreases in fishing effort from commercial and recreational fisheries for an extended period of time could allow marine stocks to recover. If fishing effort stopped for a full spawning cycle, the biomass of some species, such as herring, could nearly double. However, the pandemic is also having some negative impacts on fisheries sustainability and management.
   
  • In some areas, fishing pressure is increasing on species that are commonly canned or frozen, e.g., small pelagics and tuna.
    
  • There are currently mass migrations of city dwellers to rural areas in some countries (e.g., in India and Kenya) due to urban shutdowns to slow the spread of COVID-19. These migrations may place further pressure on marine stocks and coastal ecosystems that are already stressed. Fishing is often an “occupation of last resort” when other employment opportunities and sources of income and food are limited.
     
  • Some countries are extending their fishing seasons, halting stock assessment surveys, and decreasing fisheries monitoring, both from onboard observers and fishing patrols. NOAA Fisheries in the US recently issued an emergency action allowing it to waive requirements for fisheries observers onboard vessels and at fish processing plants for the next six months if it is deemed necessary to protect public health and safety (e.g., of fishers and observers) and maintain fish supply to markets.
     
  • Many fisheries science and management meetings are being cancelled.
     
  • Leading seafood sustainability rating organization Seafood Watch has had to substantially reduce its workforce through layoffs and furloughs.
     
• Marine aquaculture is being affected by many of the same factors as fisheries, including lack of demand for fresh seafood and trade restrictions. In addition, fish farmers are incurring expenses to continue feeding stocks that they are not harvesting, and they are running into problems importing brood stock.
   
• What else might the future hold for fisheries? A thought piece from the Center for Strategic and International Studies suggests some possibilities:
   
  • The reshoring of fisheries processing to avoid trade restrictions associated with the pandemic
  • Upticks in IUU fishing due to decreased monitoring
  • Increased transshipments at sea to enable longer trips to deal with restricted access to ports and decrease the likelihood of COVID-19 transmission to crews
  • Increases in human rights violations, including possible marooning of crew members displaying symptoms of disease.
     
• The UN Food and Agricultural Organization has a host of recommendations for mitigating the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the fisheries and aquaculture sectors and seafood consumers. Some recommendations include:
   
  • Government purchases of excess seafood supply for institutions such as prisons
  • Restricting fishing to levels that match demand to keep prices level
  • Direct financial assistance to fishing vessel owners and crews
  • Increased access to credit programs and loan forgiveness for seafood industry businesses
  • Reducing trade restrictions on food items
  • Increasing remote monitoring and surveillance of fishing activity.
     

• Seychelles finalizes plan to protect 30% of its EEZ, ~400,000 sq. km
• Great Barrier Reef suffers most widespread mass bleaching to date
• Silt and nutrient runoff from Australian wildfires likely to impact coastal ecosystems
• Study identifies 10 priority sites for protecting biodiversity in ABNJ
• Climate change may shift where marine aquaculture can take place
• Many highly mobile species cannot keep up with climate change in hotspots
• New tool for mapping shallow seafloor discovered
• Floating solar technology for coastal ocean taking big steps forward
• Paper examines inequities in distribution of ocean goods and services
• International fisheries agreements do not consider stock shifts
• Scientists find evidence for seasonal migrations on deep seafloor
• Current 50-year floods may occur annually for most of coastal US before 2050
• Study suggests marine ecosystems could largely recover by 2050 if major pressures mitigated (read publication)
• Tropical ocean ecosystems may collapse within decade without greenhouse gas emission reductions (read publication)
• Experts estimate $175 billion a year needed to achieve SDG 14
• New taxonomy of conservation finance strategies and mechanisms available
• Overview and recommendations for resilience-based management available
• Coral atlases for Western Micronesia now available
• And, of course, the Trump administration continues to roll back environmental regulations in the US

In April, the Mulago Foundation, which funds organizations that fight poverty, pooled advice from leaders in its network who have steered their institutions through Ebola, the 2008 recession, and other crises. The advice is pithy, insightful, and provocative. It is highly relevant to small-to-mid-size NGOs, and many others will find it useful as well. The advice is available in English, Spanish, French and Portuguese.

In addition, Mulago also hosted a wonderful webinar on this topic – full of useful advice on how to ensure the survival of an institution, maintain its progress, and respond to opportunities that will arise during the crisis. You can watch a recording of the webinar here.

Editor’s note: Every month, I skim dozens of newsletters, reports, and articles for material relevant to managing and conserving marine ecosystems. And every month, I’m a little shellshocked by the onslaught of bad news. People ask me how I like my job, and I tell them that I love the oceans, I love the work, and I love the people I work with, but it is profoundly sad to chronicle the decline of ocean ecosystems. I know many Skimmer readers have these same – and perhaps even more intense – feelings and experiences. Several recent studies and a body of recent reporting are now providing a framework for recognizing and legitimizing these feelings and experiences as well as highlighting the need to develop systems to deal with them. This Skimmer provides a brief summary of recent research and news in the hopes it can help marine conservation and management practitioners move forward with their vital work studying, managing, and protecting marine ecosystems.

What is ecological grief?

• As professionals in the marine conservation and management field, Skimmer readers are hyperaware of large scale and global changes to marine ecosystems – changes including loss of biodiversity, top predators, iconic species, and biomass and the degradation of habitats. These changes are due to climate change, overfishing, coastal development, and other human activities.
   
• New research is now examining the emotional and psychological toll that these changes are having on people, especially:

• Marine planning and management trainings added to Skimmer database
• Final session to negotiate new UN Law of the Sea high seas biodiversity treaty to begin in March (read analysis of draft treaty)
• Ireland publishes draft national marine planning framework
• Experts identify priority deep-sea areas for monitoring and conservation
• New paper examines the future of global food provision from the ocean
• Policy brief assesses 18 opportunities to increase ocean-based climate strategies
• Decarbonization and implementing adaptation measures can substantially reduce losses to global GDP from sea level rise
• Climate change and Brexit upsetting European fisheries
• US NOAA releases 2019 Arctic Report Card
• International coalition forms to advance ocean-based renewable energy
• New research shows that fisheries that are managed doing better than fisheries that are not
• Study reviews progress in integrating climate change adaptation into MPA design and management
• China phasing out single-use plastics – bans plastic bags in major cities by end of 2020
• New accounting method suggests far more microplastics in ocean than previously thought

Some more climate change-related news and resources:

Editor’s note: The EBM Tools Network got started in 2005-2006 under the leadership of Patrick Crist, then the director of conservation planning and ecosystem management at NatureServe. Over the past 14 years, the Network has grown to over 11,000 coastal and marine conservation and management practitioners worldwide, and is now run by OCTO, which also publishes this newsletter. For this issue of the Skimmer, we catch up with Crist, now principal at the consultancy PlanIt Forward, to see how conservation planning tools have changed over this time.

Skimmer: What changes have you seen in the use of conservation planning tools since the EBM Tools Network got started in 2005-2006? Are more conservation projects and groups using them? If so, why do you think this change has occurred?

Crist: It is really hard to quantify the use of tools – I haven’t seen any polling or studies on this although it would be really informative. Given that most conservation software is free, it is hard to tease apart casual downloads from actual application. For example, when the NatureServe Vista decision support system became free, there were about 2000 downloads worldwide almost immediately and there have typically been a few hundred every year since then. Periodic polling of the registrants, however, suggests single-digit percentages of actual use.

Last month, The Skimmer released a compilation of role-playing/simulation games to educate stakeholders, professionals, students, and the general public about aspects of coastal and marine conservation, management, and adaptation. We’ve just added nine more games to the game compilation. Check out the newbies:

• Ahli Bakua
• EcoOcean
• Fishbanks by MIT Sloan
• FiShcope
• Fishing for the Future
• GPMax
• LittoSIM
• MarePolis
• Water Life: Rivers meet the Sea.

Editor’s note: In last month’s issue, The Skimmer interviewed three practitioners about their experiences developing and using serious games to educate stakeholders, professionals, students, and the general public about aspects of the conservation and management of coastal and marine ecosystems. This month we interviewed Harald Warmelink, a senior research project leader at Breda University of Applied Sciences in the Netherlands, about his work developing the serious game MSP Challenge. Warmelink’s work focuses on the design, use, and evaluation of serious games for policy analysis, decision-making, management, and organization, as well as their gamification.

The Skimmer: Can you tell us a little bit about your game and the target audience?

Warmelink: As we wrote in the article “Communicating Maritime Spatial Planning: The MSP Challenge approach”: “The MSP Challenge Simulation Platform integrates real geodata (both marine and human activities) sourced from a great many proprietary institutions and data-portals (such as IMO, HELCOM, EMODnet, and national data centers) with science-based simulation models for shipping, energy and ecology (Ecopath with Ecosim). The data and models have been linked together in a game engine (Unity) to create an interactive simulation platform. This simulation platform allows anyone – experts as well as non-experts – to creatively operate it for scenario development, and/or for multi-player game sessions. This can have multiple purposes such as scenario exploration, co-design, validation or policy-oriented learning. Although the simulation platform has taken a significant step towards becoming a next generation marine planning support system, it continues to use play mechanics, in the form of player roles, scenarios and challenges.”

Historically, games were a means for young people to learn critical survival skills. In recent decades, however, games have come to be viewed as simply a source of entertainment. A recent movement – “serious gaming” – is now revitalizing the idea that games can do a lot more than just entertain. It is showing that they can be a powerful tool for teaching, engaging stakeholders, conducting research, and evaluating public policy. For instance, serious games can:

• Help players better understand complex topics and the interests of a wide variety of groups, promoting thinking about systems as a whole
• Let players experiment with and see the consequences of different choices over time, promoting longer-term thinking
• Create a high level of engagement with the public, potentially at lower cost than other more traditional engagement activities
• Help policymakers and researchers understand stakeholder decision making and the way stakeholders may respond to a variety of policy choices.

This month The Skimmer has compiled information about role-playing/simulation games designed to educate stakeholders, professionals, students, and the general public about aspects of coastal and marine conservation, management, and adaptation. These serious games allow players to experiment with coastal and marine conservation, management, and adaptation actions (or inaction) to help players, researchers, and policymakers better understand how coastal and marine ecosystems (including resource users and human communities) work. We also interview a range of game developers about their experiences using their games in the field.

Look through our new compilation for a serious game for your coastal and marine conservation, management, and adaptation work.

Read about how these games are being used to engage stakeholders, educate students and the general public, and conduct research.

The Skimmer interviewed three practitioners about their experiences developing and using serious games to educate stakeholders, professionals, students, and the general public about aspects of the conservation and management of coastal and marine ecosystems. Learn about:

• How the Reef Stakes game is being used across Southeast Asia to explain the complexity of multi-stakeholder decision-making processes and highlight threats to coral reef ecosystems
• How the Ocean Limited game is being used in Germany to allow players to take on stakeholder roles and negotiate interests in marine resources
• How the Fishing in the Food Web game is being used in Argentina to introduce players to complex marine ecological concepts and stimulate discussion about how marine ecosystems work.

One striking commonality of these stories is the ability of games to engage a wide variety of audiences – oftentimes even wider audiences than those for which they were developed – in discussion and learning about the conservation and management of marine ecosystems.