From Ancient Practice to Global Crisis: The History and Impact of Overfishing

Fishing is one of the oldest professions in the world, as societies residing along the seashores have harvested marine species for millennia. Over the last centuries, fishing has become a more specialized industry. Although the overharvesting of fish and other organisms has happened over the centuries, the advent of industrialization has resulted in a potentially dangerous situation that may threaten humanity’s survival over the next 100 years.

Remains of fish found near the leftover of many of our humanoid ancestors indicate that fish and other maritime resources have long been a component of human evolution, even without the help of sophisticated tools. Fishing dates to the early times of humanity and, combined with game hunting and the gathering of edible plants, fruits, and nuts, made up the great majority of Homo Sapiens’ existence on this planet. Early human drawings and archaeological finds underscore our species’ exploitation of rivers, lakes, and nearby ocean shores to supplement diets.

The advent of the Neolithic Revolution— the domestication of plants and animals—roughly 12,000 years ago did not displace fishing. On the contrary, fishing became a seasonal and cyclical activity that saw humans tending to farms during certain times of the year while braving the oceans in search of fish during others. In the Pacific Ocean, where subsistence depended heavily on resources from the sea, ingenious forms of aquaculture developed. The historical importance of fishing is highlighted because this activity has left a cultural imprint on many leading global religions. Professional fishermen existed but were rare compared to farmers who would take to the seas seasonally.

A commercial fisherman unloads a large catch with the assistance of a crane. Many species are now threatened by overfishing (Nikita Vishneveckiy/Dreamstime.com)

The development of a more commercially oriented fishery industry originates in northern Europe’s late medieval and early modern periods. Traditionally, fishermen employed spears, baited hooks, or small nets to capture prey. However, the introduction of drift nets and, later, weighted trawling nets that dragged along the ocean floor to catch herring in the North Sea allowed more significant quantities to be captured. By the twelfth century, Hanseatic traders had already developed the long-distance fish trade and demanded a surplus beyond individual subsistence. Curing, drying, and salting techniques extended the limited durability of fresh fish. Over the following centuries, Dutch shipbuilding primarily developed decked vessels to allow such techniques to move offshore.

This permitted fishermen to venture further into the ocean for extended periods and thus opened the door for the professionalization of this trade. Combined with climate change resulting from the Little Ice Age, this increasing predation on oceanic resources caused declines in European-Atlantic fish stocks. It propelled the search for new grounds in the recently encountered Americas. The uncovering of rich fishing regions off the eastern shores of North America underpinned English and French settlements, whose colonists eagerly learned from Native American artisanal fishing techniques. Yet, much like in Europe, the increasing predation displaced small-scale seasonal fishing, which allowed stock recovery and, by the seventeenth century, gradually placed strains on fish populations.

Early interactions between the fishing industry and the targeted fish population left a negative impact. However, the innovations derived from industrialization and technologization put local pressures on fish stocks and created a global crisis. Motorized steam and later internal combustion engines transformed shipping. The introduction of refrigeration, followed by freezing, made ships even more self-sufficient and increased their ability to stay on the oceans for months. Lastly, the development of sonar and echosounding techniques during the two world wars made locating and catching schools of fish much more effortless.

Ironically, the global wars of the early twentieth century allowed for the recovery of selected fish stocks; however, fishing fleets taking to the oceans following the 1950s were much better equipped and started to pose a grave danger. Overfishing— removing a particular fish faster than the species can reproduce—became the norm and not just the exception. It is not only the removal of specific species that devastates overfishing. Bottom trawling is also highly destructive in sensitive coral environments. Likewise, the unintended catch of certain maritime species while trawling for another—a process known as bycatch—increases the damage done exponentially. Shrimp trawling, for instance, can produce bycatch ratios of 20:1; for every shrimp caught, twenty other marine organisms end up in the net. Although bycatch is generally discarded in the open ocean, many are injured or dead once returned to the water.

In the third decade of the twenty-first century, the result of overfishing is sobering, as the earlier chapter on environmental issues revealed. By 2019, it was estimated that over 35 percent of all commercially captured fish were considered overfished beyond recovery. Beyond such seemingly hopeless statistics emerge some more optimistic signs. Developed in the 1980s, Exclusive Economic Zones include fisheries’ rights extending from the shore by 200 nautical miles. Nations with extensive coastlines are thus given access and the power to police larger aquatic areas, which aided in creating marine sanctuaries. Overseeing such vast, watery expanses is more manageable for larger developed nations, while smaller countries without adequate Coast Guard vessels frequently sell their fishing rights to foreign entities with large fleets.

There are also indications that aquaculture reduces the need for fishing. If global catches peaked by 2000 at 95 million tons and then slowly declined, by 2015, aquaculture started to outpace fish captures with 106 million tons. One must balance such slightly optimistic statistics with the fact that 30 percent of all captures are illegal and thus not reported. Illegal fishing involves dangerous techniques such as “ghost” and explosive fishing. Explosive fishing, as the name indicates, encompasses using dynamite and other hazardous substances to stun fish to make them easier to catch. Disrupting the marine environment, dynamite fishing also shakes and kills many marine organisms not collected by the fishermen. Similarly, “ghost” fishing involves discarding nets on the open ocean rather than safely disposing of them. The dumped “ghost” netting continues drifting in the sea, randomly entangling and killing marine species. Rainer F. Buschmann

FURTHER READING: Bolster, W Jeffrey. 2014. The Mortal Sea: Fishing in the Atlantic in the Age of Sail. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

Fagan, Brian M. 2006. Fish on Friday: Feasting, Fasting and the Discovery of the New World. New York: Basic Books.

Kurlansky, Mark. 1998. Cod: A Biography of the Fish that Changed the World. New York: Penguin. Roberts, Callum. 2007. The Unnatural History of the Sea. Washington, DC: Island Press.