Talk outline:
- Background on the Mid-Atlantic Fishery Management Council (MAFMC)
- MAFMC strategic plan prioritizes “development of ecosystem approaches that are responsive to the effects of climate change”
- MAFMC's Ecosystem Approach to Fishery Management (EAFM) process integrates climate with other Council concerns and priorities
- Ecosystem reporting: one stop shopping for current conditions and recent research, presented annually and used to update risk assessment--evolving to better meet Council needs.
- Current/future: East coast climate scenario planning, NOAA Climate Fisheries Initiative for forecasts
- Success hinges on collaboration, stakeholder engagement throughout, learning by doing
The Mid-Atlantic Fishery Management Council (MAFMC)
How did MAFMC develop their ecosystem approach?
Visioning Project → Strategic Plan that developed the 2016 Ecosystem Approach to Fishery Management (EAFM) Policy Guidance document: http://www.mafmc.org/s/EAFM-Doc-Revised-2019-02-08.pdf
"A non-regulatory umbrella document intended to guide Council policy with respect to ecosystem considerations across existing Fishery Management Plans"
Details, including workshop presentations and white papers: http://www.mafmc.org/eafm
Integrated Ecosystem Assessment and the MAFMC Ecosystem Approach
- Direct link between ecosystem reporting and risk assessment
- Climate in risk assessment from species and habitat perspective
- Climate in conceptual model linking across risk elements for individual species
State of the Ecosystem (SOE) reporting
Improving ecosystem information and synthesis for fishery managers
Ecosystem indicators linked to management objectives (DePiper, et al., 2017)
- Contextual information
- Report evolving since 2016
- Fishery-relevant subset of full Ecosystem Status Reports
Open science emphasis (Bastille, et al., 2021)
Used within Mid-Atlantic Fishery Management Council's Ecosystem Process (Muffley, et al., 2021)
- Risk assessment (Gaichas, et al., 2018)
- Conceptual modeling (DePiper, et al., 2021)
- Management strategy evaluation (MSE)
State of the Ecosystem summary emphasizing climate risk
State of the Ecosystem → Risk assessent example: Commercial revenue
This element is applied at the ecosystem level. Revenue serves as a proxy for commercial profits.
| Risk Level | Definition |
|---|---|
| Low | No trend and low variability in revenue |
| Low-Moderate | Increasing or high variability in revenue |
| Moderate-High | Significant long term revenue decrease |
| High | Significant recent decrease in revenue |
Ranked moderate-high risk due to the significant long term revenue decrease for Mid-Atlantic managed species (red points)
Key: Black = Revenue of all species combined;
Red = Revenue of MAFMC managed species
State of the Ecosystem → Risk assessent example: Commercial revenue
This element is applied at the ecosystem level. Revenue serves as a proxy for commercial profits.
| Risk Level | Definition |
|---|---|
| Low | No trend and low variability in revenue |
| Low-Moderate | Increasing or high variability in revenue |
| Moderate-High | Significant long term revenue decrease |
| High | Significant recent decrease in revenue |
Ranked moderate-high risk due to the significant long term revenue decrease for Mid-Atlantic managed species (red points)
Key: Black = Revenue of all species combined;
Red = Revenue of MAFMC managed species
Risk element: CommRev, unchanged
SOE Implications: Recent change driven by benthos. Monitor changes in climate and landings drivers:
- Climate risk element: Surfclams and ocean quahogs are sensitive to ocean warming and acidification.
- pH in surfclam summer habitat is approaching, but not yet at, pH affecting surfclam growth
Risks to meeting fishery management objectives
Risks: Climate change, multiple elements
Indicators: ocean currents, bottom and surface temperature, marine heatwaves
Implications: Climate change and managed species Risk elements unchanged, new info:
Climate: 6 low, 3 low-mod, 4 mod-high, 1 high risk
Multiple drivers with different impacts by species
Chesapeake Bay warm winter, low freshwater flow
- Striped bass poor recruitment observed
- plankton prey too early?
- poor plankton transport?
- Blue crab better survival over winter
- Striped bass poor recruitment observed
Ocean acidification impact on shellfish growth
- Surfclams vulnerable to increased temperature and acidification
- Areas of low pH identified in surfclam and scallop habitat
- Lab work in progress identified pH thresholds for surfclam growth: approaching threshold
DistShift: 2 low, 9 mod-high, 3 high risk species
Shifting species distributions alter both species interactions, fishery interactions, and expected management outcomes from spatial allocations and bycatch measures based on historical fish and protected species distributions.
How is MAFMC using the risk assessment? What's next?
- Based on risk assessment, the Council selected summer flounder as high-risk fishery for conceptual modeling
Working group of habitat, biology, stock assessment, management, economic and social scientists developed:
- draft conceptual models of high risk elements, linkages
- dataset identification and gap analysis for each element and link
- draft questions that the Council could persue with additional work
Final conceptual model and supporting information at December 2019 Council meeting
- Council proceeding with management strategy evaluation (MSE) using the information from conceptual modeling as a basis. Topic: addressing recreational fishery discards with EAFM
Current and Future: East Coast Climate Scenario Planning, NOAA Climate and Fisheries Initiative
Collaboration is key!
- Within the science community – diverse expertise is needed
- Between science and management – understanding what information is needed and important to management, providing tools to management to understand ecosystem linkages and implications
- Between science and stakeholders – need to build trust, open dialogue (everyone is heard), and sharing data and observations (on water and with information)
- Between management and stakeholders – listening to/acting on stakeholder priorities and feedback, process not out to add more uncertainty but provide for more informed decisions
