Anticipating how spatial fishing restrictions in EU waters perform to protect marine species, habitats, and dependent fisheries

François Bastardie^1*Amaia Astarloa²Logan Binch³Isabella Bitetto^2,4Dimitrios Damalas⁵Jochen Depestele⁶Pierre -Yves Hernvann⁷Sigrid Lehuta^3,7Jonas Letschert⁸Irida Maina⁵Stéphanie Mahévas⁷Georgia Papantoniou⁵Miriam Püts⁸Giovanni Romagnoni⁹Maria Teresa Spedicato⁴Klaas Sys⁶Iriniki Tsikopoulou⁵Gert Van Hoey⁶Walter Zupa⁴Anna Rindorf¹⁰

• ¹Technical University of Denmark, Kongens Lyngby, Denmark
• ²AZTI, Marine Ecosystems Functioning, Pasaia, Spain
• ³Aquaculture and Fisheries Group, Wageningen University, Wageningen, Netherlands
• ⁴Fondazione COISPA ETS, Bari, Italy
• ⁵Institute of Marine Biological Resources and Inland Waters, Hellenic Centre for Marine Research (HCMR), Attiki, Greece
• ⁶Flanders Research Institute for Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (ILVO), Oostende, Belgium
• ⁷IFREMER, Nantes, France
• ⁸Thünen Institute of Sea Fisheries, Bremenhavn, Germany
• ⁹Department of Agricultural Economics, Kiel University, Kiel, Germany
• ¹⁰Section for Ecosystem-Based Management, Technical University of Denmark, Institute for Aquatic Resources, Kgs. Lyngby, Denmark

This study investigates the implications of spatial management strategies on fish populations and fisheries across EU waters, particularly focusing on establishing potential areas for fishing closures to protect nurseries, benthic communities, and biodiversity hotspots in the Northeast Atlantic and Mediterranean Sea. The research addresses the effectiveness of prohibiting certain fishing practices in the context of the EU Common Fisheries Policy (CFP). We investigate spatial- and effort-based fisheries management strategies based on spatial ecosystem modelling, which provides insights into species interactions and distribution shifts, and bioeconomic fisheries models which incorporate finely defined fishing fleets and economic dynamics. Our findings emphasise that redistributing fishing effort without reducing overall effort and catches may negate intended decreases in mortality rates of sensitive marine species or restoration of vulnerable marine habitats to the status targeted by the European marine legislation (EU Marine Strategy Framework Directive MSFD). We highlight the complex interplay of social, economic, ecological, and institutional factors influencing fishers' decision-making in effort displacement. As the proportion of closed regions increases, potential effects on marine ecosystems can even be damaging in the short term to some sensitive species (such as the endangered, threatened and protected species ETP) and vulnerable habitats (with currently high relative benthic status RBS). This emphasizes the importance of the placement of closed areas and of combining area-based management with other fishery management measures. Findings from case studies in the North Sea, Mediterranean Sea, and Bay of Biscay indicate that prohibiting certain fishing practices in designated areas will likely induce short-term economic losses on specific fishing fleets. Where the prohibitions contribute to improved selectivity or productivity of the fish stocks, these losses may be regained in the long term. Finally, the long-term benefits for marine life that are expected through the spatial protection of vulnerable life stages and habitats will rely on the extent to which climate change affects ocean productivity and distribution of species and habitats.