The occupation of commercial fishing is recognized as a comparatively stressful and hazardous job characterized by a myriad of risks to health, including high rates of job-related injury, morbidity, and mortality. Nonetheless, systematic study of fisher health is limited. This paper examines a particularly understudied aspect of illness among fishers: the physical and social contexts, pathways, and potential for adverse disease interactions. The focus of the paper is on a biosocial disease process called syndemics, which increases the health burdens of this population. The paper is presented as an initial testing of the hypothesis that a “lens” of syndemics improves occupational health research and advocacy for commercial fishermen who face a substantial burden of biosocial challenges.
Free, C. M., Anderson, S. C., Hellmers, E. A., Muhling, B. A., Navarro, M. O., Richerson, K., Rogers, L. A., Satterthwaite, W. H., Thompson, A. R., Burt, J. M., Gaines, S. D., Marshall, K. N., White, J. W., & Bellquist, L. F. (2023). Impact of the 2014–2016 marine heatwave on US and Canada West Coast fisheries: Surprises and lessons from key case studies. Fish and Fisheries, 24, 652–674. https://doi.org/10.1111/faf.12753
The authors would like to update Figure 1, as the published version is incorrect. In Panel A, two of the years in the facet labels are wrong.
Revised Figure 1
We apologize for the error.
The management of fish aggregating devices (FAD) creates heated debates in tuna fishery management organizations striving to reduce the number of deployed floating objects. Through several econometric models and a machine learning approach, we evaluate the consequences of three management scenarios on the catch and profit of the French purse-seine fleet operating in the Indian Ocean: (1) a half reduction in the number of authorized buoys per vessel, (2) a 72-day closure of FAD fishing with and (3) without re-allocation of effort on free schools. The results show a significant decrease of fleet profits by 7%, 10% and 18% respectively. We hypothesize an “economic trap” of FAD fishing caused by the far greater efficiency of this harvesting technique for larger vessels searching for economies of scale, and by the overfished status and catch limitation of yellowfin (Thunnus albacares) and bigeye (Thunnus obesus) tunas in the Indian Ocean. The results are compared with other studies looking at the impact of FAD management measures in other oceans.
Decapod crustacean welfare is not only an ethical consideration for legislative purposes. Under culture and fishery settings, poor environmental conditions and operator practices can cause stress, which compromises the immune system and increases the risk of disease. For finfish, there are established environmental and animal (group, individual) welfare indicators. This is not the case for crabs, lobsters or shrimp. While environment-based indicators like temperature, pH and oxygen levels are easily transferable, there is no consensus for a common measure of stress to monitor welfare in decapod crustaceans. To address this shortcoming, we conducted a meta-analysis of the primary literature to test for relationships between haemolymph (blood) condition, for example, levels of glucose, L-lactate, haemocytes (n = 8), and sources of physical stress, for example, handling, trawling, emersion and transport (n = 12). Despite variations in effect sizes (n = 459), generalised linear mixed models repeatedly ranked L-lactate (followed by urea and glucose) as the most significant physiological predictor of stress in the haemolymph, with trawling followed closely by emersion as the most impactful stressors. Duration post (stress) exposure, sex (male, female), water temperature and moult stage (pre-, inter-, post-moult) were not associated significantly with stress prediction using the selected biochemical and cellular parameters, however, moult status was undefined in ~48% of literature sources and should be interpreted with caution. We present evidence that quantitating L-lactate levels in the haemolymph represents a physiologic operational welfare indicator of decapod crustaceans, which complements existing condition/vigour indices.