Abstract

Caribbean reef fisheries are predominantly dependent on nearshore coral reef ecosystems, which are characterised by strong habitat dependence, susceptibility to coastal impacts, diffuse landing sites, and strong multispecies and multi-gear interactions. The complexity of this socio-ecological system precludes knowing the system state in space and time sufficiently for management under a single-species approach. Ecosystem-based management (EBM) offers a distinctly different approach, one which is based on maintaining ecosystem health and productivity and focusing on system resilience. In the absence of complete data, management must be based on first principles regarding productivity and ecosystem health. These include maintaining ecosystem integrity and function, protecting habitats and water quality, applying the precautionary approach, monitoring reference points, and recognising that production has limits. These principles dictate management strategies for data collection, expanded authority, and management tactics and regulations such as marine reserve networks, closed spawning aggregations, gear restrictions to maintain trophic balance and habitats, targeted data collection and assessments, ecosystembased or community-based metrics, and adopting co-management practices. The potential socio-ecological impacts of management failure suggest that fisheries adopt the approach of highly reliable organisations. Current activities within the Caribbean region indicate the basis for change is present, but adoption of full EBM will require refocusing and integration across multiple agencies.

Introduction

Napoleon wrote of the fog of war: ‘A general never knows anything with certainty, never sees his enemy clearly, and never knows positively where he is.’ One can equally speak of a ‘fog of fisheries’: A manager never knows anything with certainty, never sees the fishery clearly, and never knows positively where the stock is. Here the word ‘where’ can refer to the location of the stock in physical space, but more importantly it also can refer to its position relative to some optimal target value or critical threshold. Levels of fishing effort, fishing methods, the behaviour of fishers, market forces, community composition, trophic structure and competing sources of anthropogenic stress (from habitat degradation to global warming) evolve at rates that make it difficult for managers to know the current status of a stock with any certainty. In the Caribbean, as elsewhere, there is a long history of fisheries managers having to deal with an ever increasing array of factors affecting ecosystem health and fish productivity (Appeldoorn 2008a).