Nicholas Institute for Environmental Policy Solutions
Fishing boat by the seashore
Image by Arek Socha from Pixabay / https://pixabay.com/photos/seashore-fishing-boat-fishing-boat-1783904/
ISSUE

Fisheries and Food Security

To sustainably feed 9.6 billion people, overfished stocks must be rebuilt, and the production and environmental performance of aquaculture must be increased. 

Toward this end, the Ocean and Coastal Policy Program works with tropical governments to identify policies to help rebuild or maintain marine fisheries so that they can contribute more food and jobs to help end hunger and poverty. Currently, the program is working with the Duke Marine Lab, the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization, and WorldFish to conduct a global assessment of the contributions of small-scale fisheries to sustainable development, entitled Illuminating Hidden Harvests. Finally, the Program housed the Fisheries Leadership & Sustainability Forum, a program that provided policy-neutral support to U.S. federal fisheries managers from 2008–2018. Archived resources are available at fisheriesforum.org.

Projects

Foreground: Women gather on a beach with buckets to collect fish; background: boats lined up on shore

Illuminating Hidden Harvests

Illuminating Hidden Harvests is a global initiative of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), Duke University, and WorldFish to generate and disseminate new evidence about the benefits, interactions, and impacts of small-scale fisheries to inform policy and practice.

Oceans at Duke banner image credit Frédéric Ducarme

Oceans@Duke

Oceans@Duke is a multidisciplinary community of Duke’s scholars working on challenges to sustainable use of the oceans.

School of fish. Image credit unsplash/Sebastian Pena Lambarri

Fisheries Leadership & Sustainability Forum

The Fisheries Leadership & Sustainability Forum (2008-2018) provided policy-neutral support to strengthen the federal fisheries management process. It provided expert convening, facilitation, and research services on a wide range of fisheries science and management topics.

Fishing Pier repair image credit FEMA

Applying GEMS with the NOAA Restoration Center

Increasingly, restoration funders and practitioners are paying attention to how coastal restoration projects affect people and communities.The GEMS project identified metrics for social and economic outcomes of coastal restoration, including employment, local economy, recreation, food provision, and mental health benefits. We are now working to apply the GEMS methods for assessing fishing and related outcomes to support restoration decisions made by NOAA’s Damage Assessment Remediation and Restoration (DARRP).