High-grading is the decision by fishers to discard fish of low value that allows them to land more valuable fish. A literature review showed high-grading is reported in commercial and non-commercial fisheries around the world, although the number of observations is small. High-grading occurs in fisheries that are restricted to land their total catch due to management, market or physical constraints. Using the mixed flatfish fishery as a model system, a dynamic state variable model simulation showed that high-grading of certain grades occurs throughout the year when their ex-vessel price is low. High-grading increases with the degree of quota restriction, while the level of over-quota discarding is unrelated to the quota level. The size composition of the high-graded catch differs from the landed catch. Due to the differences in the seasonal variation in size specific ex-vessel price, the effect of quota restrictions on the size composition of the discarded catch is nonlinear. High-grading is difficult to detect for the fishery inspection as it occurs on-board during the short period when the catch is processed. We conclude that highgrading is under-reported in fish stocks managed by restrictive quota, undermining the quality of stock assessments and sustainable management of exploited fish stocks.

North Sea cod Gadus morhua stock is outside safe biological limits, and total allowable catch (TAC) management has proved ineffective to rebuild the stock. The European Commission is considering the imposition of a discard ban to preserve vulnerable and economically important fish stocks. We explored the potential effects of a discard ban in mixed fisheries management using the French mixed fisheries in the Eastern English Channel as a model system. We examined in particular the performance of 2 different management scenarios: (1) individual quota management with a tolerance for discarding and (2) individual quota management in combination with a discard ban, using a dynamic state variable model. The model evaluates a time series of decisions taken by fishers to maximize profits within management constraints. Compliance to management was tested by applying an in-height varying fine for exceeding the quota. We then evaluated the consequences of individual cod quota in both scenarios with respect to over-quota discarding, spatial and temporal effort allocation and switching between métiers. Individual quota management without a discard ban hardly influenced fishers' behaviour as they could fully utilise cod quota and continue fishing other species while discarding cod. In contrast, a discard ban forced fishers to reallocate effort to areas and weeks in which cod catch is low, at the expense of lower revenue. In general, a restrictive policy for individual quota for cod needs to be combined with a discard ban and a high fine (>20 times the sale price) to reduce over-quota discarding.

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Large-scale exploitation of higher trophic levels by humans, together with global-scale nutrient enrichment, highlights the need to explore interactions between predator loss and resource availability. The hypothesis of exploitation ecosystems suggests that topdown and bottom-up control alternate between trophic levels, resulting in a positive relationship between primary production and the abundance of every second trophic level. Specifically, in food webs with three effective trophic levels, primary producers and predators should increase with primary production, while in food webs with two trophic levels, only herbivores should increase. We provided short-term experimental support for these model predictions in a natural benthic community with three effective trophic levels, where the number of algal recruits, but not the biomass of gastropod grazers, increased with algal production. In contrast, when the food web was reduced to two trophic levels by removing larger predators, the number of algal recruits was unchanged while gastropod grazer biomass increased with algal production. Predator removal only affected the consumer-controlled early life-stages of algae, indicating that both the number of trophic levels and the life-stage development of the producer trophic level determine the propagation of trophic cascades in benthic systems. Our results support the hypothesis that predators interact with resource availability to determine food-web structure.

Climate change is anticipated to have long-term and widespread direct consequences for the European marine ecosystems and subsequently for the European fishery sector. Additionally, many socio-economic and political factors linked to climate change scenarios will impact the future development of fishing industries. Robust projection modeling of bioeconomic consequences of climate change on the European fishing sector must identify all these factors and their potential future interaction. In this study, four socio-political scenarios developed in the EU project CERES (Climate change and European aquatic RESources) were operationalized and used in model projections of marine wild capture fisheries. Four CERES scenarios (“World Markets,” “National Enterprise,” “Global Sustainability” and “Local Stewardship”) were based on the IPCC framework of Shared Socio-economic Pathways (SSPs). For each of these scenarios, a set of quantitative outputs was generated to allow projections of bio-economic impacts to mid-century (2050) on wild-capture fisheries operating in different European regions. Specifically, projections accounted for future changes in fisheries management targets, access regulations, international agreements, fish and fuel prices, technological developments and marine spatial planning. This study thoroughly describes the elements of these four fisheries scenarios and demonstrates an example of the “regionalization” of these scenarios by summarizing how they were applied to the North Sea flatfish fishery. Bioeconomic projections highlight the importance of future developments in fuel and fish price development to the viability of that and other fisheries. Adapting these scenarios for use in other models and regions outside the 10 European fisheries examined in CERES would be highly beneficial by allowing direct comparison of the bioeconomic risks and opportunities posed by climate change.