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Technical Documentation, State of the Ecosystem Report

Introduction

The purpose of this document is to collate the methods used to access, collect, process, and analyze derived data (“indicators”) used to describe the status and trend of social, economical, ecological, and biological conditions in the Northeast Shelf Large Marine Ecosystem (see figure, below). These indicators are further synthesized in State of the Ecosystem Reports produced annually by the Northeast Fisheries Science Center for the New England Fisheries Management Council and the Mid-Atlantic Fisheries Management Council. The metadata for each indicator (in accordance with the Public Access to Research Results (PARR) directive) and the methods used to construct each indicator are described in the subsequent chapters, with each chapter title corresponding to an indicator or analysis present in State of the Ecosystem Reports. The most recent and usable html version of this document can be found at the NOAA EDAB Github. The PDF version of this document is for archiving only. The PDF version from previous years is archived in NOAA’s Institutional Repository.

Indicators included in this document were selected to clearly align with management objectives, which is required for integrated ecosystem assessment (Levin et al. 2009), and has been advised many times in the literature (Degnbol and Jarre 2004; Jennings 2005; Rice and Rochet 2005; Jason S. Link 2005). A difficulty with practical implementation of this in ecosystem reporting can be the lack of clearly specified ecosystem-level management objectives (although some have been suggested (Murawski 2000)). In our case, considerable effort had already been applied to derive both general goals and operational objectives from both US legislation such as the Magnuson-Stevens Fisheries Conservation and Management Act (MSA) and regional sources (DePiper et al. 2017). These objectives are somewhat general and would need refinement together with managers and stakeholders, however, they serve as a useful starting point to structure ecosystem reporting.

Map of Northeast U.S. Continental Shelf Large Marine Ecosystem from J. Hare et al. (2016).

Figure 0.1: Map of Northeast U.S. Continental Shelf Large Marine Ecosystem from J. Hare et al. (2016).

The list below shows which versions of all related products correspond to a specific State of the Ecosystem report cycle. The reports and supporting products including the technical documentation are developed annually. The DOI links will be included once they are available so may lag.

DOIs * MAFMC SOE 2020 * NEFMC SOE 2020 * Technical Documentation SOE 2020 * MAFMC SOE 2021 * NEFMC SOE 2021 * Technical Documentation SOE 2021 * MAFMC SOE 2022 * NEFMC SOE 2022 * Technical Documentation SOE 2022 * MAFMC SOE 2023 * NEFMC SOE 2023 * Technical Documentation SOE 2023

References

Degnbol, P., and A. Jarre. 2004. “Review of Indicators in Fisheries Management – a Development Perspective.” African Journal of Marine Science 26 (1): 303–26. https://doi.org/10.2989/18142320409504063.
DePiper, Geret S., Sarah K. Gaichas, Sean M. Lucey, Patricia Pinto da Silva, M. Robin Anderson, Heather Breeze, Alida Bundy, et al. 2017. “Operationalizing Integrated Ecosystem Assessments Within a Multidisciplinary Team: Lessons Learned from a Worked Example.” ICES Journal of Marine Science 74 (8): 2076–86. https://doi.org/10.1093/icesjms/fsx038.
Hare, JA, WE Morrison, MW Nelson, MM Stachura, EJ Teeters, and RB Griffis. 2016. “A Vulnerability Assessment of Fish and Invertebrates to Climate Change on the Northeast US Continental Shelf.” PLoS ONE 11.
Jennings, Simon. 2005. “Indicators to Support an Ecosystem Approach to Fisheries.” Fish and Fisheries 6 (3): 212–32. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-2979.2005.00189.x.
Levin, Phillip S, Michael J Fogarty, Steven A Murawski, and David Fluharty. 2009. “Integrated Ecosystem Assessments: Developing the Scientific Basis for Ecosystem-Based Management of the Ocean.” PLoS Biol 7 (1): e1000014. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.1000014.
Link, Jason S. 2005. “Translating Ecosystem Indicators into Decision Criteria.” ICES Journal of Marine Science 62 (3): 569–76. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.icesjms.2004.12.015.
Murawski, S. 2000. “Definitions of Overfishing from an Ecosystem Perspective.” ICES Journal of Marine Science 57 (3): 649–58. https://doi.org/10.1006/jmsc.2000.0738.
Rice, Jake C., and Marie-Joëlle Rochet. 2005. “A Framework for Selecting a Suite of Indicators for Fisheries Management.” ICES Journal of Marine Science 62 (3): 516–27. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.icesjms.2005.01.003.