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What does it mean to have a "sustainable fishery"? Why was it difficult to determine this in the deep sea?

User Catchwa
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Final answer:

A sustainable fishery is managed to keep fish populations healthy for the future, requiring regulations like fishing limits. The deep sea is challenging for sustainability due to limited data, environmental difficulty, and slow organism recovery. The 'tragedy of the commons' and technology also complicate sustainable management.

Step-by-step explanation:

Having a "sustainable fishery" means that the fishery is managed in a way that maintains fish populations at healthy levels without compromising the needs of future generations. This involves setting strict fishing limits to prevent overharvesting and to avoid the collapse of fish stocks. Sustainability balances current fishing practices with long-term ecological and economic stability. However, determining sustainability in the deep sea presents challenges due to factors like the scarcity of data on deep-sea species, the difficulty of accessing these environments, and the slow growth rates and reproduction of deep-sea organisms, which make them particularly vulnerable to overfishing.

The difficulty in establishing sustainable fisheries in the deep sea is also exacerbated by the 'tragedy of the commons', where individual fishers have little incentive to exercise restraint in harvesting resources that are considered to be common property. Moreover, the technological capabilities that allow massive quantities of fish to be harvested rapidly can lead to unsustainable practices. Effective regulation is essential to prevent overexploitation and ensure that fisheries can continue as a vital source of food and income for generations to come.

User Rahul Chaurasia
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