Background
The Pacific Fishery Management Council has fishery management plans (FMPs) for groundfish (e.g., rockfish, flatfish, roundfish, sharks and skates); salmon (e.g., Chinook and coho); highly migratory species (e.g., tunas, sharks, swordfish, mahi mahi); and coastal pelagic species (e.g., anchovy, market squid, Pacific sardine, Pacific and jack mackerel, krill). Climate change is considered as an ancillary element to these FMPs; although it is not clearly distinguished as a specific threat to fish stocks, the Council's efforts reduce fishing as a stressor on the marine ecosystem. The Council engaged in a seven-year-long process to develop an ecosystem-based approach to managing fish stocks in the offshore waters of Washington, Oregon, and California. Ecosystem-based management as defined by the Council “recognizes the physical, biological, economic, and social interactions among the affected components of the ecosystem and attempts to manage fisheries to achieve a stipulated spectrum of societal goals, some of which may be in competition.” An ecosystem Fishery Management Plan, therefore, considers species interactions (i.e. predator-prey food web dynamics), habitat, fishing effects on stocks and habitat quality, elements of uncertainty and utilizing precaution where possible, and the effects of other stressors, including climate change, on fish biology and ecology. The development of this plan allowed the Council to consider various natural and anthropogenic elements that may affect conservation and fishery productivity.
Implementation
The Council first voted to create Fishery Ecosystem Plan (FEP) in November 2006. Development was delayed until funding could be obtained; by 2009, the Council had financial support from NOAA to create a plan that would supplement the existing FMPs, “[help] with coast-wide research planning and policy guidance, and [create] a framework for status reports on the health of West Coast ecosystems” (PFMC EBM Overview). The Council created two groups: the Ecosystem Plan Development Team (EPDT; now the Ecosystem Workgroup) and the Ecosystem Advisory Subpanel (EAS). The EPDT was composed of 13 members, including policy analysts and scientists from state, federal, and tribal governments. The EAS was composed of 11 members, representing industry, policy, and conservation interests from the states and tribes. The EPDT and EAS were charged with developing goals and objectives for the EFMP. Their specific tasks were to collate state-of-the-science information on ecosystem-based management, review existing FMPs for examples of ecosystem-based management, find tools that could be used in the development of the FEP, and review other ecosystem-based management efforts from the other Fishery Management Councils. In April 2013, Council members formally adopted the current FEP. In 2017, the Council released Appendix A to the FEP, which includes initiatives to better understand the impacts of climate change on fish populations and the ecosystems on which they rely, and strategies to increase the resilience of managed stocks.
Citation
Gregg, R. M. (2021). Using Ecosystem-Based Management as an Adaptation Strategy in the Pacific Fishery Management Council [Case study on a project of the Pacific Fishery Management Council]. Version 2.0. Product of EcoAdapt’s State of Adaptation Program.
This case study was originally published on the EcoAdapt Climate Adaptation Knowledge Exchange.
