This may come as a surprise – but it was always the plan.
Our Fish began in 2017 as a short term project to help end overfishing in the EU. We didn’t finish in 2020, as first planned – because by then we’d realised the critical importance of getting the climate and ecosystem impacts of fishing recognised, and there was still a lot of work to be done.
Now, by collaborating with scientists, NGOs, members of parliament, policymakers, fishers and artists, we’ve successfully changed the political agenda. It’s time to step back and allow other NGOs and campaign groups to carry the work forward.
We’ve worked with scientists around the world to reframe fisheries management as carbon management and climate action. We’ve run briefings, workshops, seminars, open letters, science symposiums, webinars, ocean dives, events in the EU, at UN climate conferences (UNFCCC COPs), the UN Ocean Conference and in EU member states.
The International Council for the Exploration of the Sea has now established a workshop and group to investigate and calculate the impact of fishing on ocean carbon. The science on this will continue to progress and provide the data needed for the EU to make better fisheries management decisions for the sake of the climate. .
We’ve shown that a just transition to low impact and low carbon fishing is possible. We worked with fishers, scientists and economists to show that the EU Common Fisheries Policy already has in place the necessary tools for incentivising a shift to low impact and climate wise fishing that is also beneficial for fishers and coastal communities. There is no longer any excuse for subsidies and quotas to benefit destructive fishing practices and the fossil fuel industry – these benefits should only go to responsible and sustainable fishers, and fuel a positive feedback loop of incentives for improving sustainable fisheries. .
The European Commission has committed to developing a guide for the use of environmental, social and economic criteria when allocating fishing quota to incentivise the transition to low impact low-carbon fishing. The European Commission and Council are also negotiating the elimination of fossil fuel tax subsidies, which should be concluded by mid-2024. .
Tens of thousands of people, artists and allies have taken action to show EU fisheries and environment ministers that there is strong public support for ending overfishing. Together we’ve signed petitions, emailed MEPS, sent postcards, projected messages on EU buildings, made a public mural in Lithuania, sent our very own superheroes – the ‘Ocean Avengers’ – to Brussels and much more! .
In the recent Marine Action Plan package, the EU Commission committed to mapping blue carbon and the impact of fishing on the seabed, as well as phasing out destructive bottom trawling – there is still a way to go, but EU decision makers have heard us.
Thank you to all of you that have taken action to address overfishing in the EU and helped change the outlook for fish, the ocean and the climate!
Throughout the campaign, we’ve worked closely with allies across the NGO world. As Our Fish steps back, they will be continuing work to protect the biodiversity of the ocean and ensure that the fish in our ocean can continue to play their essential role in combating climate change, so do get in touch with them to continue following this effort.
Thank you for joining us in celebrating over a decade of action to end overfishing!
Since 2009, the Fishlove campaign has been at the forefront of the battle against overfishing, striving to restore the balance of the oceans. Our Fish is working with Fishlove because we believe that ending overfishing is not only achievable but also the key to decisive EU action on climate change, bolstered by the presence of healthy marine ecosystems. Fish are carbon engineers – the keystones of the ocean’s biological pump, the system constantly at work capturing and storing excess carbon from the atmosphere. It is our responsibility to give them the space and protection they need to perform their vital role.
As you explore the captivating portraits within the exhibition at the Esplanade in front of the European Parliament, you will witness major celebrities such as Helena Bonham Carter, Gillian Anderson, Jean-Marc Barr, Sean Penn and many more, joining us in sending a resounding message: the ocean needs our urgent protection for the sake of future generations. The courage and inspiration these celebrities have shown through their involvement in the Fishlove campaign is truly remarkable. We believe that ambition is not contagious, but inspiration is. During this EU Ocean Week, we invite you to join us in finding inspiration from their commitment and taking action to protect our oceans.
EU decision-makers have a crucial role to play in this mission. It is time for them to be as bold as the celebrities captured in these portraits. Our Fish and Fishlove call upon the European Commission, Parliament and EU Member States to transform fisheries management so that it can contribute to climate action and achieve a just transition to low impact and low carbon fishing practices.
The clock is ticking – the next decade of ocean climate action is critical.
In Brussels? Come visit, Ending EU Overfishing: The Decade Past and the Decade to Come photographic exhibition featuring 20 Fishlove celebrities from the EU, UK and US – posing naked with fish. Where? On the Esplanade outside the EU Parliament.
Can’t make it to Brussels? Watch the FishLove slideshow here, or discover the complete collection of fishlove portraits at the Fishlove website.
This exhibition marks the end of six years of the Our Fish campaign. We now pass the baton to our colleagues at Oceana, Seas At Risk and ClientEarth to continue to demand political action that responds to the urgency of the planetary crisis we face.
Scientific workshop organised by ICES (International Council for the Exploration of the Sea) on Assessing the Impact of Fishing on Oceanic Carbon.
Tuesday 25 – Thursday 28 April, ICES heartquarters, Copenhagen, Denmark
Our Fish has recently returned from Denmark, where we took part in a workshop that brought together experts from around the world to explore the relationship between fish, fishing and the ocean’s carbon cycle.
This is a significant milestone for the success of Our Fish as we have long advocated for incorporating the climate impacts of fishing into decision-making processes.
Fish play a crucial role in the ocean’s carbon cycle, but fishing can disrupt this balance in multiple ways. Not only does it remove fish from the ecosystem, but it can also lead to changes in the food web and disturb the seafloor, both of which affect the amount of carbon stored in the ocean. At the workshop, experts from a range of disciplines, including biologists, oceanographers, fisheries scientists, and social scientists, discussed the need for a holistic, multidisciplinary approach to address the complex issues surrounding fishing and carbon cycling in the ocean. Following three days of in-depth discussions, the experts reached a consensus that fishing impacts the ocean’s ability to sequester carbon in multiple ways, and therefore, we need to start managing those impacts.
“Governance and management approaches should be developed now, in parallel with the fishing/carbon science providing metrics, thresholds, and advice. If we don’t do this, the science becomes an academic exercise.”
What will happen now:
The workshop’s findings are a significant breakthrough in the way we think about managing fisheries and have some important implications for EU fisheries management. Future management strategies should consider direct and indirect emissions from fishing, including fuel usage and seabed carbon release, as well as impacts on the ocean’s carbon budget, food web impacts and biodiversity. It will be a significant step forward in ensuring that fishing practices are more sustainable and environmentally friendly. Ultimately, this will help protect the oceans and our planet for future generations.
The roadmap developed at the workshop will soon be available and a policy brief will follow in a couple of months.
Excerpt: Dr Emma Cavan speaks at the Danish Parliament, April 25, 2023
Danish parliamentary event organised by Our Fish and Socialistisk Folkepart marine environment rapporteur Marianne Bigum.
On Tuesday April 25, Our Fish together with Danish Socialistisk Folkeparti (SF) hosted an event in Denmark’s Parliament: The scientific pathway to nature and climate friendly fisheries and its relevance to Danish climate and biodiversity obligations.
We brought together experts, policy-makers and stakeholders to explain the latest science behind fisheries management as carbon management and discuss how to accelerate the much needed transition of Danish fleets to low-impact and low-carbon fishing.
It was quite chilly in Copenhagen, but it was not just the cold that was giving us the chills – it was the urgency of addressing climate change! Thankfully, the experts at our event warmed us up with some hot-off-the-press scientific insights on how good fisheries management is good carbon management and can help us mitigate climate change.
We heard two great contributions from Dr. Emma Cavan of Imperial College London, and Søren Jacobsen of Foreningen for Skånsomt Kystfiskeri Producentorganisation (FSK-PO – the Danish low impact fishers organisation). While Emma focused on the role of fish in the ocean biological carbon pump and its importance from the climate perspective, Søren explained the need to support more sustainable fishing fleets, especially through the implementation of Article 17 of the Common Fisheries Policy (CFP), which states that fishing access should be allocated by EU member states according to transparent economic, social and environmental criteria. The presentations were then followed by an engaging panel discussion that prompted thought-provoking questions from the public.
Some key takeaways:
fishing activities not only reduce carbon sequestration but also increase emissions from the ocean, disturbing the entire ecosystem;
the benefits of the ocean’s carbon storage are threatened by destructive fishing practices in Denmark that extract blue carbon from the ocean, releasing it back into the atmosphere;
Denmark’s efforts to meet its climate and biodiversity goals are falling short, necessitating swift and decisive action in the fisheries sector,
Denmark should move towards low-carbon, low-impact fishing that is based on the latest scientific data, ends overfishing and restores ocean ecosystems, ensuring that fish populations can deliver their vital ecological functions;
ecosystem-based fisheries management in Denmark can contribute to climate mitigation, improving fishers’ returns, contributing to local sustainable development and enhancing resilience to the ongoing impacts of climate change
marine spatial planning in Denmark must address both the biodiversity and climate crises to provide a framework in which Danish fishery is a part of a sustainable blue economy.
Event speakers:
Dr. Emma Cavan, Research Fellow, Imperial College of London
Rebecca Hubbard, Program Director, Our Fish
Søren Jacobsen, Chairman of Foreningen for Skånsomt Kystfiskeri Producentorganisation (FSK-PO)
Diver in Costa Brava, Spain. Helmut Corneli / Alamy Stock Photo.
The ocean is the planet’s largest ‘carbon sink’, absorbing around one quarter of annual global carbon dioxide emissions. This is not simply a chemical process; but a phenomenal biological pump filled with trillions of active carbon engineers, namely plankton, fish and whales, who cycle and recycle energy and carbon throughout the ocean every day. This carbon sink – the ocean’s biological pump – relies on mangroves, seagrasses and seabeds to store the carbon away for hundreds or thousands of years. A healthy ocean is clearly of critical importance to the functioning of Earth’s planetary systems, not least of which is the climate. Despite this staggering reality, the ocean is one of the most overlooked tools we have for mitigating the impact of climate change.
This amazing oceanic system, however, is in danger of collapse, largely due to unrelenting pressure from fishing. In particular, destructive fishing, like bottom trawling, is driving the loss of marine biodiversity, weakening the biological pump, and diminishing the resilience of marine life to the effects of climate change.Above the surface, fishing fleets belch out millions of tonnes of CO2 every year, fuelled by state subsidies, while bottom-trawlers plough up and disturb carbon-rich seabeds, habitats and wildlife.
These impacts on the ocean provide yet more evidence that we are stressing the limits of planetary boundaries, the potential consequences of which threaten societal collapse. We need to educate, organise and act in ways commensurate with that threat. In December at the Kunming-Montreal Global biodiversity framework governments committed to protecting 30 percent of the planet’s ocean and land by 2030 and to ensuring that “agriculture, aquaculture, fisheries and forestry are managed sustainably, in particular through the sustainable use of biodiversity”. They must now follow these commitments with immediate action.
We have seven years – that’s seven harvests, two Olympic Games, two football World Cups, seven Eurovision song contests. This time will pass quickly and we have limited opportunities for decisive action. However, the ocean and fisheries management are intertwined and provide a scarce opportunity to take action for climate, biodiversity, and the wellbeing and livelihoods of dependent communities.
The scientific evidence and experience of those working on the ocean is clear: reducing fishing pressure most often results in rebuilt fish populations, which deliver as much or more fish, with less effort (and burn less fossil fuels). This is a rare and desperately needed win-win for the ocean and for fishers.
The European Commission has been struggling to realise this reality for over ten years. Its latest attempt – published recently – is neither ambitious nor comprehensive enough – it outlines baby steps when we need giant leaps. However, it does outline how to transition the fishing industry to one that is low impact and low carbon, including the mapping of seabed carbon stores and the impact of bottom trawling on them; removing trawling from Marine Protected Areas; and applying transparent environmental, social and economic criteria when allocating access to fishing resources. Faced with the current climate and biodiversity emergency, these measures should be within the scope of EU member states to adopt.
For too long, fishing and the fishing communities have been out of sight of senior EU decision-makers and have not featured in their decision-making. They, along with the ocean and all of its many carbon engineers, deserve to be in the spotlight as governments deliver decisive and significant action while ensuring a just transition to a low impact, low carbon, resilient future. By working with the European Commission and member state governments, civil society must cut through the thick layers of rhetoric to deliver for the ocean, its engineers, fisheries and communities. We do not have time for anything less.
What: COP15 Biodiversity Webinar: Fish are Carbon Engineers
When: 14-15:00 CET/ 08-09:00 EST, Wednesday 14 December
Who: Our Fish and guests
About: Fish, like whales and plankton, are keystones of the ocean’s biological pump, the system constantly at work producing energy and capturing and storing excess carbon from the atmosphere. Effective fisheries management can help to conserve that system and in turn combat climate change and protect biodiversity. Governments meeting at the Convention on Biological Diversity must acknowledge and prioritise ecosystem-based fisheries management as good carbon management and essential to biodiversity protection.
Check out the video recordings for a lively discussion with representatives from civil society, government and the scientific community regarding the evidence in support of fisheries management as carbon management, and the opportunities and challenges for maximising this to deliver on biodiversity and climate action commitments.
Panelists:
Dr. William Cheung – IPCC Lead Author and Professor and Director, Institute for the Oceans and Fisheries, The University of British Columbia Dr. Emma Cavan – Research Fellow, Department of Life Sciences, Imperial College London Isabella Lovin – former Deputy Prime Minister and former Environment Minister of Sweden, Co-Chair of Friends of Ocean Action Ska Keller – German Member of the European Parliament and former Co-President of the Greens/EFA Group Dr Guillermo Ortuño Crespo – marine scientist working on international fisheries management and Instigator of the Early Career Ocean Professional Program under the UN Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development.
Live interpretation to Spanish and French was provided and recorded:
Our fish at European Institutions, 7-8 November 2022, ahead of launch of Fish are Carbon Engineers paper at COP27 in Egypt.
Every fish that swims through the ocean is a carbon engineer. Along with whales and the billions of tiny ocean-dwelling organisms called plankton, fish are keystones of the ocean’s biological pump, the system constantly at work capturing carbon from Earth’s atmosphere and taking it deep beneath the waves.
Every day, the Earth’s largest migration carries carbon – including whale and fish poo – from the sea’s surface to the ocean floor, where its stored in marine sediments – twice as much as is stored in soils on land. Fish and other marine animals are the carbon engineers of this cycle, taking this carbon to the depths, and protecting us from the worst impacts of climate change.
Yet we’re not giving these intrepid engineers the respect they deserve. Every year, an incredible 80 million tonnes of fish are taken from the ocean – removing significant amounts of “blue carbon”. Our demand for fish has halved fish’s biogeochemical impact on the ocean, weakening its capacity for climate mitigation. While the fight is on to end humanity’s harmful fossil fuel emissions, we’re in danger of squandering an important tool for keeping the planet cool.
It’s not all bad news. Good fisheries management can help to conserve the ocean pump. Good fisheries management is carbon management – Our Fish is on a quest to plant this idea firmly in the heads of policy makers – and to ensure they not only grasp thatfish arecarbon engineers, but take real political action using that knowledge to protect the ocean, to protect the climate, and to protect people.
We want governments to implement ecosystem-based fisheries management – this means restoring fish populations, conserving the ocean’s interlacing food webs, and banning activities that wreck the seabeds and marine ecosystems. More simply, end overfishing, and end destructive forms of fishing like bottom trawling.
And that, dear reader, is how we found ourselves outside a November morning, offering Egyptian cakes and coffee to people outside the European Parliament, and how Our Fish surfaced at the COP27 climate summit in Egypt to present a short briefing on the idea – Fish are Carbon Engineers
Brussels – Our Fish Returns
As another round of battle for the climate kicked off in Egypt, the Our Fish team was in Brussels, setting up fake palm trees, a tent and outsized postcards, for our COP27-themed Fish are Carbon Engineers extravaganza near the European Commission and European Parliament, puzzled commuters made their way to their offices.
Lured in the tent with baklava and Egyptian spiced coffee, we asked people to help us build pyramid representing the ocean biological pump, and to send a COP27 postcard to European Commissioner for the Environment, Oceans and Fisheries Virginijus Sinkevičius, urging him to deliver effective fisheries management as good carbon management. Many of those who stopped to talk with us told us they hadn’t thought of the link between fish and carbon before.
Thanks to everyone who came to support us – including our friends from many other NGOs campaigning for the oceans, and to Green MEP Grace O’Sullivan from Ireland who stopped by.
Our fish at European Institutions, 7-8 November 2022, ahead of launch of Fish are Carbon Engineers paper at COP27 in Egypt.
MEP Grace O’Sullivan stops by to send the message – Fish are Carbon Engineers
Before we left Brussels, we delivered a giant COP27 postcard, covered in over 2,000 personalised messages from our supporters, to Commissioner Sinkevičius’s office, where it was accepted by his deputy head of cabinet, Carmen Priesing.
The postcard calls on the Commission to deliver the EU’s Ocean Action Plan without further delay – and demands EU leadership and urgent action on minimising the climate and ecosystem impacts of fishing. The Ocean Action Plan was supposed to be delivered in 2021, but has not yet seen the light of day. We’re still waiting.
On the final day, we delivered a giant COP27 postcard, covered in over 2,000 personalised messages from our supporters, to Carmen Priesing, Deputy Head of Cabinet to the Commissioner for Environment, Oceans and Fisheries, Carmen Priesing.
Our Fish at the Red Sea
Our shenanigans in Brussels were barely over before Our Fish’s Program Director, Rebecca Hubbard was again spreading the good word: that fish are carbon engineers – this time at COP27 in Sharm El-Sheikh.
In recent years, the ocean has become a stronger force at UN climate summits, leading to countries agreeing on an annual Ocean and Climate Change Dialogue at COP26 in Glasgow. That is a major recognition of the crucial role of the ocean, which covers a full 70% of the planet’s surface, in addressing climate change mitigation, adaptation and resilience. “Dialogue” alone, however, won’t be enough. The ocean’s role must provide a basis for real, tangible action.
The role of the ocean, and nature in general, needs to be mainstreamed and recognized within the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), but not in a way that undermines and threatens the natural carrying capacity or even risks to push us further to a planetary boundary.
Rebecca Hubbard, Programme Director for Our Fish explains – at the COP27 Nature Positive Pavilion – the crucial role that fish play as the ocean’s carbon engineers and calls for UNFCCC & UN to mainstream good fisheries management as good carbon management
Bec shared this message at a high level event hosted by the Ocean & Climate Platform and French Agency for Development on November 10th, which focused on accelerating ocean-based climate action.
With our guests, Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) scientist Professor Hans-Otto Pörtner and Dr Emma Cavan of London Imperial College, we launched our briefing – Fish are Carbon Engineers. The ensuing discussion featured speakers from the scientific community and civil society discussing evidence in support of good fisheries management as effective carbon management, and opportunities for maximising this to deliver on climate action commitments.
The next morning – November 12th Bec joined the Seas At Risk event “What shipping and fishing must do to avert climate disaster” at the EU Pavilion online. The event brought together speakers engaged in EU shipping and fishing policy to discuss the need for an urgent and transformational shift in the maritime industry to raise ambition, meet climate targets and protect blue carbon. They also discussed the risks of climate tipping points and the need for both shipping and fishing’s green transition, as well including support mechanisms for climate-vulnerable and the least developed countries. Check out the video here.
So what exactly happened at COP27?
The United Nations climate change conference, also known as COP27 (Conference of the Parties) took place in the appropriately semi-abandoned resort town of Sharm el-Sheikh on the shore of the Red Sea in Egypt – for two gruelling weeks. Tens of thousands of attendees, including the highest number of fossil fuel lobbyists ever seen at a COP, held events, lobbied, protested, networked and negotiated. With the latest IPCC reports warning that we are heading toward societal collapse as a result of breaching multiple planetary boundaries, the stakes were high.
Yet COP27 failed to deliver the level of ambition and ‘implementation’ necessary to avoid climate chaos. Commitment by governments to limit warming to 1.5 degrees was restated, but as recent reports show, actual real action to deliver these commitments is tragically slow – putting us on track for warming of around 2.5 degrees. This would create a world that will be unlivable for millions (possibly billions) of humans and contribute to the extinction of many other species. Likewise, commitment to phasing out ALL fossil fuels was watered down from the text.
This is where the buck stops – whatever else we do, we must halve CO2 global emissions by 2030. There were also intense calls for putting our trust in carbon dioxide removal (CDR), which is considered by many as unproven, highly concerning, risky technology that the fossil fuel industry is using to continue business as usual and avoid the dire need to slash CO2 emissions.
On the upside, the COP finally agreed to create a specific Loss and Damage Fund to support those nations worst affected, however all of the details on what, who, where & how have been kicked down the road to COP28 (next year). And to make this Loss and Damage financing make sense, we still need to drastically slash emissions.
The good news is that the ocean featured strongly in the final text of the “Sharm el-Sheikh Implementation Plan”, welcoming the outcomes of the ocean and climate change dialogue in 2022, adding specific details for its future functioning, and more importantly encouraging parties to implement more ocean-based climate actions in their national action plans and Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs).
As we said – we’re looking to further mainstream the ocean within the UNFCCC process – the inclusion of the ocean in COP27’s final text responds to Our Fish’s demands in our Fish are Carbon Engineers paper.
What’s Next?
Ahead of December’s Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) COP15 meeting in Montreal, Our Fish is calling on the EU to demonstrates that it is not just full of hot air – and that it will walk the talk and deliver the action necessary to halt the climate and biodiversity crisis, by accelerating a transition to low-impact, low-carbon fishing.
Rebecca Hubbard, Programme Director for Our Fish explains – at the COP27 Nature Positive Pavilion – the crucial role that fish play as the ocean’s carbon engineers and calls for UNFCCC & UN to mainstream good fisheries management as good carbon management.
The ocean is the largest store of carbon on the planet, and without it, the Earth would be 35 degrees hotter. Fish are keystones of the ocean’s biological pump, the system constantly at work capturing and storing excess carbon from the atmosphere and protecting us from the worst impacts of climate change. That’s why the protection of fish and their habitats as natural carbon engineers should be mainstreamed within the UNFCCC.
Unless urgent and comprehensive action is taken, we are heading towards societal collapse as a result of breaching multiple planetary boundaries. Our Fish proposes 6 clear recommendations for Parties to the UNFCCC COP that would ensure fish can fulfil their critical role as carbon engineers and help deliver climate action.
Fish, like whales and plankton, are keystones of the ocean’s biological pump, the system constantly at work capturing and storing excess carbon from the atmosphere. Fisheries Management can help to conserve that system and in turn combat climate change. The Ocean & Climate Change Dialogue 2022 made clear that we must protect our ocean AND value its potential as a place for sustainable climate solutions and action. The UNFCCC must now acknowledge and mainstream good fisheries management as good carbon management.
Representatives from civil society, government and the scientific community will discuss the evidence in support of fisheries management as carbon management and what opportunities exist for maximising this to deliver on climate action commitments.
Panellists: Professor Hans-Otto Poertner, Dr Emma Cavan, Rebecca Hubbard.
Interview
Rebecca Hubbard, Programme Director for Our Fish explains – at the COP27 The Nature Positive Pavilion – the crucial role that fish play as the ocean’s carbon engineers and calls for UNFCCC & UNto mainstream good fisheries management as good carbon management
