China is the largest producer and exporter of seafood products. Climate-driven disruptions could have severe consequences for ocean ecosystems and coastal communities. With a grant from the Lenfest Ocean Program, Dr. Yong Chen and Dr. Yunzhou Li of Stony Brook University are studying the risks and will provide Chinese managers and stakeholders with recommendations and guidelines to foster climate-ready fisheries. With the project in its early stages, I sat down with Yong and Yunzhou to discuss what they hope to achieve with their project.
This interview has been edited for clarity and length.
Yong Chen: China is the world’s largest seafood producer as well as a major importer and exporter of seafood products. Capture fisheries employ around 17 million people in China. So not only are fisheries vital to China’s economy and social well-being, but management in China decisively influences food security, fishery sustainability, and marine conservation globally.
As for the management context, we’ve studied how it has evolved over the last several decades. Essentially, management in the latter half of the 20th century went from focusing heavily on expansion of fisheries capacity as an economic engine to recognizing in the 21st century the need for a more conservation-oriented approach. This perspective especially emerged as the number of human-caused impacts on marine ecosystems grew, including overfishing and pollution. Thus, over time management went from maximizing catch in 1951, to zero growth in catch in 1999, to further controlling effort and catch throughout the 2000s.
Yong Chen: China’s coastal waters have been warming, a phenomenon now interacting with other human-caused pressures. We have seen an increase in the frequency and severity of marine heatwaves, coral bleaching, and coastal storms. Many small, pelagic fish, which are a primary target for Chinese fisheries, have responded with changes in their productivity and distribution. In addition, future climate scenarios show potential habitat range shifts, with some species having their stock constricted, others expanded, and yet others remaining stable.
With climate change now starting to overwhelm other impacts as the major threat to China’s marine ecosystems, the government has responded with some significant reforms. What originated as initiatives to curb overfishing morphed into a full-on transformation of marine management and policy geared more toward conservation and restoration versus just sustainability.
The newest five-year plan (2021 – 2025) calls for a much more precautionary approach to total allowable catch and implements a series of conservation measures like habitat protections, fisheries closures, and fish stocking. Also, a variety of other government documents and reports consistently prioritize ameliorating the effects of climate change and helping fisheries adapt. But they are focused on the marine environment at large and not on fisheries specifically. It seems there is a disconnect between the increasing evidence on climate change impacts and fisheries-specific policies and regulations.
Yong Chen: By addressing managers’ most pressing knowledge gaps with respect to this disconnect. Our main goal is to understand how climate change will affect China’s fisheries social and ecological systems. So, we aim to weave together information about the most vulnerable species, areas, and fisheries, and compare that to the effectiveness of current management measures. We will then develop recommendations for stronger adaptation strategies, including ways to better align emerging data and information with management decisions.
Yunzhou Li: Yes, our aim is for this work to be useful. This means we will work with managers and stakeholders throughout the project and to communicate results. In addition to publishing our findings in the peer-reviewed literature, for example, we will develop products such as technical reports and white papers that are formatted and tailored to management. Through this outreach and engagement, we hope to paint a picture of just how vulnerable China’s fisheries are to climate change while also laying out guidelines that can spark new solutions and adaptation actions.
Yunzhou Li: Sure. First, fisheries management in China is led by the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs. It is a very top-down process and while expert input is often used, there are not specific, well-known entry points for new information. So, we are working closely with research and knowledge-sharing platforms like the Marine Fisheries Partnership and China Fisheries Learning Network. Both these groups involve scientists, managers, and stakeholders that inform China’s fisheries management process. In fact, many policymakers and managers in China actively use these platforms to learn about new issues and improve management.
Chinese fisheries managers access new knowledge in two ways: The first is through a systematic review of practices from other countries who have experienced or are experiencing similar challenges, drawing from lessons learned. Second, is through expert opinion, or a process that harnesses the judgment and recommendations of experts on a particular topic. Thus, our project milestones capitalize on those two approaches:
Yong Chen: We are very fortunate to have an Advisory Committee from both the U.S. and China to help us link our findings with managers and stakeholders. On the U.S. side we have Dr. Kristin Kleisner from Environmental Defense Fund; Dr. Jason Link from NOAA Fisheries; and Dr. Kathy Mills of the Gulf of Maine Research Institute. From China, we have Dr. Feiyan Du of the South China Sea Fisheries Research Institute and the China Academy of Fisheries Sciences; Dr. Yiping Ren from Ocean University of China; and Dr. Yi Tang of Shanghai Ocean University. Not only are these folks expert in the science, they all have extensive experience on the best ways to meaningfully engage managers and stakeholders on the policies and regulations.
Yunzhou Li: We aim to work with the Advisory Committee alongside the Marine Fisheries Partnership and China Fisheries Learning Network to develop adaptation strategies that could be applied to specific case study fisheries. As part of this, we’ll conduct interviews with fishers to shed light on their understanding of vulnerability. We’ll also develop a series of outreach plans to share all that we’re learning through these networks, including planning events, workshops, communications materials, and meetings.