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Climate change not to blame for cod population decline

Nature Sustainability volume 1, pages 262–264 (2018)Cite this article

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Three decades of increasing temperature were expected to cause cod stocks to decline in the North Sea and Gulf of Maine, but they increased in the North Sea and declined in the Gulf of Maine. These trends are due to changes in fishing pressure rather than climate change.

In July 2017, the North Sea cod stock gained a sustainable rating from the Marine Stewardship Council following sixteen years of lower fishing pressure. Such successes for fisheries management deserve to be celebrated, as they show what can be achieved with regional cooperation and effective control. In contrast, however, the Gulf of Maine cod stock has continued to decline and higher temperatures, associated with climate change, have been blamed. Both stocks experienced very similar trends in temperature over the past 30 years, but fishing pressure on them followed different trajectories, pointing to overfishing as the more likely principal driver of the observed changes. Blaming the wrong primary driver may result in the wrong remedial action being taken. Climate research is often given media prominence, but the scientific community must guard against overemphasizing the role of climate. Increasing awareness of climate impacts does not, unfortunately, mean that familiar problems caused by other human pressures on natural resources (such as overfishing, habitat degradation and pollution) have gone away.

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Fig. 1: Cod stocks and fishing mortality in the Gulf of Maine and North Sea.
Fig. 2: North Atlantic cod stocks with habitat temperatures.

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  1. DTU Aqua, Technical University of Denmark, Kongens Lyngby, Denmark

    Keith M. Brander

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Correspondence to Keith M. Brander.

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Brander, K.M. Climate change not to blame for cod population decline. Nat Sustain 1, 262–264 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41893-018-0081-5

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