What Is Overfishing Destroying The Ecosystem Of The Ocean?

The Earth is full of diversity; countless amount of species inhabits the planet. According to an article by marinebio, “An estimated 50-80% of all life on earth is found under the ocean surface and the oceans contain 99% of the living space on the planet. Less than 10% of that space has been explored by humans. 85% of the area and 90% of the volume constitute the dark, cold environment we call the deep sea” (Marinebio). This statistic just shows how diverse and enigmatic the ocean is. Despite the ocean’s abundance of marine life and complex ecosystem, it is being destroyed by fisheries. How are these fisheries destroying the ecosystem of the ocean? The answer is overfishing. Overfishing is the depletion of fish stock by too much fishing. Although

Overfishing is certainly an environmental issue because it affects the planets ecosystem due to human interference. One example of this is when a marine species is exploited, other species are also affected directly. According to the article, ‘Global Consequences of Overfishing’ states that, “...recent studies suggest that overfishing of large shark species has had a ripple effect in the shark 's food chain, increasing the number of species, such as rays, that are usual prey for large sharks, which result in declining stocks of smaller fish and shellfish favored by these species” It is also important to mention that overfishing often leads to the killing of other animals unintentionally. This is called bycatching. Some marine species that are affected by bycatching are juvenile fish, bottom feeding organisms, sharks, whales, sea turtles, and birds. Losing ecological stabilization and unity will inevitably lead to the collapse of the ocean’s system. Not only does overfishing lead to environmental impacts, but also social and economic impacts. An example of this was the collapse of the Atlantic cod fishery in the 1990s. As a result, thousands of individuals left the fishery hoping to work in other areas. Overfishing also greatly affects developing nations, including small islands. For example, in African and South Asian coastal nations, fish takes up about a huge portion of their diet. With a decline in fish stocks, these

The market environmentalist approach is that the market will solve the environmental issue(s). In this case, a market environmentalist would argue that right based approaches would be an answer. An example of a market environmentalist approached would be to implement individual fishing quotas (IFQ). The idea of individual fishing quotas is identical to the concept of cap and trade. It is a catch share, which means it is a method to set percentage as to how much fish can be harvested. Of course, every solution has its strengths and