Ellen Marsden, a professor of fisheries at the University of Vermont, wrote in an e-mail that fish sustainability is a “major issue, as fisheries management has struggled for decades with the problem of how to fish sustainably, and largely failed.”
The issues, according to Marsden:
• “Data uncertainty (it’s hard, and expensive, to know exactly how many fish there are, how old each one is, how many are mature, and how many eggs they are producing — let alone be able to predict these data even one or two years ahead, which is what is required to manage harvest);
• “Political unwillingness to make decisions that hurt fishermen and the fishing industry, including processors and markets;
• “Connectivity of ecological systems, so that fishing one species may damage populations of its predator, and other linked species;
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