Humans are venturing farther across the oceans and harvesting a greater proportion of the ocean's biomass to feed the world's appetite for seafood.
Reg Watson at the University of Tasmania in Taroona, Australia, and his colleagues analysed global fisheries, and seafood import and export data. They found that the minimum distance between where seafood is sourced and where it is consumed increased nearly sixfold from 1950 to 2011. Humans are now exploiting nearly 40% of the ocean's primary productivity, up from roughly 15% in 1950.
The team predicts that the world's growing demand for seafood will be met only until about 2050, unless changes are made in marine farming.
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Farming footprint is rapidly growing. Nature 523, 9 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1038/523009e
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/523009e
