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Maybe this is something that has never crossed your mind: despite the benefits of eating seafood, what are the ethical implications of doing this? Seafood consumption impacts consumers and the marine environment in both positive and negative ways. Fish consumers may experience an increase of gray matter in the brain, as well as nutritional benefits, but those benefits may be balanced against mercury contamination. Environmental impacts include unsustainable harvesting and other alterations to the oceans’ health. Yes, you probably heard about all of these before. However, in addition to consumer-related and environmental concerns, labor trafficking (over 45 million people around the globe are trapped in some form of slavery, see the Global Slavery Index 2016 ) – has become an issue in the fishery industry worldwide. Do you know or do you even care if your fish was caught with forced labor? Forced labor or labor trafficking encompasses a range of activities (e.g.: recruiting, harboring, ...

The understanding the state of conservation of marine ecosystems and the distribution and recovery capacity of marine species continue to gain momentum among marine scientists, marine resource users and other stakeholders. The main concern is overfishing, which affects the supply of seafood, income generation for large, medium and small-scale fisheries and the livelihoods of resource-dependent coastal communities, especially those in the developing world. Of the approximately 250,000 catalogued marine species, about 16,000 species are exploited by commercial fisheries. Projections made by marine scientists estimate between 2 to possibly 10 million fish species   yet to be discovered and probably exploited. Predictive models coupled with bibliometric analyses showed that in the first decade of 2000 the number of authors describing new species each year increased to up to 4,900 authors. In Brazil, which covers almost half of South America and holds more than 20% of...

Since 2010, the Brazilian government has not collected fish landing data, essential information for the monitoring the Brazilian marine fisheries. There is also no information on the actual number of fishermen, the number and capacity of the vessels involved and the state of the infrastructure linked to fishing. Without such basic information, we are left in total darkness in a game of guessing what is happening to our oceans and to the food that so many people depend upon for their food security and livelihood. Copacabana no Rio de Janeiro  We have repeated over and over: fishing statistics are fundamental to know the state of exploitation of our fish stocks. If we do not know what is happening to them, how could we propose sound management measures? How can we address the criticism of fishermen when they disagree with our proposals? In most cases, we only have scattered information to support our claims, while fishermen, especially the industrial ones, may have economic power to ...

Regardless of the industry or interests involved, most people have probably heard, at least once, about the importance of having good data. Good data, coupled with good data analyses, are critical to supporting better decisions of any kind, and avoid wasting time. The Brazilian aquaculture industry, together with government agencies, provide a lot of data, which is usually poorly analyzed, which motivated the creation of the web application ProjectAqui. This app was developed to present, in an interactive way, information on the aquaculture production of the Brazilian states and South American countries.  It aims to enable policymakers, researchers, and other stakeholders to explore local and continental patterns of growth and decline in the aquaculture industry. The information can be displayed as total production and also sorted by species. The data used correspond to the most recent reports published by the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics (IBGE - 2013-2016) and b...

Leandro Castello’s research program focuses on the ecology and conservation of fish and fisheries in relation to global change processes, with particular attention to tropical regions. Most of his research has been on Arapaima spp., one of the largest and most overexploited fishes of the Amazon Basin.  His research on arapaima has focused on the migration, reproduction, abundance, and population dynamics, as well as on the skills and knowledge of arapaima fishers.  These studies have led to the development of a successful model of community-based management, where fishers themselves assess arapaima populations to determine fishing quotas*. This model has been successfully replicated throughout the Amazon, in and outside Brazil. Lorena Candice, one of the FEME members and a personal fan of Leandro’s, interviewed him about his research. She is personally happy for having had this chance and we are even happier for learning about his opinions.   FEME: After almost 20 years ...