Editorial: Ecocentric fisheries management in European Seas, volume II: e-tools, management scenarios, and capacity building to support decision making in fisheries and ecosystems

Fisheries management has traditionally focused on maintaining the productivity of individual commercially exploited stocks, and ecosystem processes are rarely incorporated into operational decision-making (Skern-Mauritzen et al., 2016). However, fishing affects not only target species but also their predators, prey and competitors, as well as non-target species, habitats, and the structure and functioning of entire food webs (Pauly et al., 1998; Pikitch et al., 2004). There is increasing awareness that these effects interact with climate change, pollution, biological invasions, habitat alteration, and the expanding use of marine space, exposing marine ecosystems to multiple and potentially cumulative pressures (Bastardie et al., 2021; Korpinen et al., 2021). It is for this reason that Ecosystem-based fisheries management (EBFM) seeks to move beyond single-species assessments by incorporating ecological interactions, environmental forcing, habitat conditions, and the social-economic, and institutional dimensions of fisheries (Link and Browman, 2014; Long et al., 2015; Stephenson et al., 2017). The objective of EBFM is to maintain productive fisheries while balancing food production and economic viability with biodiversity conservation, ecosystem resilience, and healthy seas (Haugen et al., 2024; Link, 2010; Pikitch et al., 2004).

The first volume of this Research Topic focused on the foundations required for this transition: identifying biological and ecological knowledge gaps, improving data availability, assessing exploited and non-commercial populations, and developing baseline food-web models for European marine ecosystems (Tsikliras et al.). These contributions demonstrated the value of ecosystem models for describing trophic structure, evaluating fishing impacts, and establishing reference conditions. However, models and improved datasets contribute to operational EBFM only when their outputs are translated into indicators, reference points, harvest rules, spatial measures, or other actions that can directly inform management decisions. The next challenge is to translate this knowledge into accessible and transparent decision-support tools that can evaluate alternative management actions, account for uncertainty, and communicate their ecological and socioeconomic consequences to managers, stakeholders, and the wider public.

Against this background, Volume II focuses on the practical steps needed to operationalize EBFM. Specifically, it aimed to: (i) promote the development and application of e-tools that support decision-making in EBFM; (ii) assess marine ecosystems under alternative fisheries-management and climate-change scenarios; (iii) improve the integration of ecological, social, and economic information; (iv) incorporate historical, spatial, market, vessel-monitoring, and other emerging datasets into ecosystem assessments; and (v) strengthen capacity building, stakeholder involvement, and knowledge exchange. Collectively, the contributions move beyond the identification of data gaps and construction of baseline models to the practical application of ecosystem knowledge through scenarios, integrated assessment methods, and accessible decision-support tools. The contributions also highlight the need for explicit institutional pathways through which ecosystem evidence can routinely inform scientific advice, management measures, implementation, and subsequent evaluation.

The present Research Topic includes seven original articles, a brief research report, one methodological article, one systematic review, and one policy and practice review. The seven original articles focus on social perceptions, fisheries economics and the impact of anthropogenic activities on marine ecosystems. Using an Ecosim model, Akoglu et al. identify the effects of anthropogenic stressors on the Sea of Marmara between the period 1990 and 2020, including the resulting two regime shifts. Ofir et al. focus on the impact of climate change and non-indigenous species on Israel’s fishing economy by linking an EwE ecosystem model to a value-chain analysis. Papantoniou et al. use an EwE model to examine the potential impacts and interactive effects of climate warming and multiple fishing gear in the Eastern Ionian Sea ecosystem and highlight the need for concrete steps to mitigate future climate impacts on the fisheries. Saygu et al. apply historical ecosystem models as a baseline for indicator-based assessment of the North Sea showing how industrialized fishing caused cascading food-web changes, and reduced ecosystem maturity and resilience over the course of a century. Nielsen et al. conduct a retrospective analysis on the effects of offshore wind farms on fisheries and benthic habitat interactions by using data from the North Sea, Kattegat, and Western Baltic Sea.

In more socio-economic accounts of EBFM, Briguglio et al. examine the awareness and understanding of the EBFM term in the UK and its implications for marine policy. Based on auction records, Vidal et al. compared the landings, revenues and price structures between two auction sites in Spain. Touloumis et al. offer a brief research report on biomass rebuilding and fleet profitability across eight European ecoregions. In their methodological article, Nascimento et al. focus on improvements to the “MSP Challenge” platform, in particular the representation of pressures characteristic of offshore wind farms and functional responses of organisms, using the western Baltic Sea as an example. The systematic review conducted by Chakravorty et al. addresses the social and economic consequences of fisheries policies and environmental change through the use of food web models.

Finally, Daskalov et al. offer a policy and practice review which examines the data, modelling tools, indicators, legal frameworks and stakeholder processes required to make ecosystem-based management operational. The review synthesizes the EcoScope project experience and presents its principal outputs (EcoScope Platform, Toolbox, Academy, mobile application and stakeholder forum), while identifying remaining limitations in socioeconomic data, model applications and integration with formal advisory and decision-making processes.

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Footnotes

Edited and reviewed by: Stephen J. Newman, Fisheries Science, Australia