{"id":24343,"date":"2026-06-16T15:17:47","date_gmt":"2026-06-16T15:17:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/2026\/06\/16\/msc-claims-overfishing-persists-despite-fao-report-findings-the-fishing-daily\/"},"modified":"2026-06-16T15:17:47","modified_gmt":"2026-06-16T15:17:47","slug":"msc-claims-overfishing-persists-despite-fao-report-findings-the-fishing-daily","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/2026\/06\/16\/msc-claims-overfishing-persists-despite-fao-report-findings-the-fishing-daily\/","title":{"rendered":"MSC Claims Overfishing Persists Despite FAO Report Findings – The Fishing Daily"},"content":{"rendered":"

email editor<\/a>\"The-Fishing-Daily-Email\"<\/a>
\"The-Fishing-Daily-Email\"email editor<\/a>
by Oliver McBride<\/a><\/span> | Jun 16, 2026<\/span> | International Fishing News<\/a>, Latest News<\/a>
MSC responds to FAO report, warning overfishing persists as only 62.4% of stocks are sustainable despite gains in many regions now.
The UN’s Food and Agriculture\u00a0Organisation\u00a0(FAO) launched its latest\u00a0<\/span>State of World Fisheries and Aquaculture<\/span><\/i><\/a>\u00a0report at the Our Ocean Conference, in Mombasa, Kenya, at an event co-organized by the MSC. <\/span><\/strong>
The report uses\u00a0new\u00a0methodology\u00a0to\u00a0analyse\u00a0more fish\u00a0stocks\u00a0than\u00a0previous\u00a0assessments, providing\u00a0a\u00a0more detailed update on\u00a0the\u00a0state of\u00a0global\u00a0fisheries resources.<\/span>\u00a0
Overfishing continues\u00a0to be\u00a0a serious problem. The\u00a0share\u00a0of stocks\u00a0classified as biologically sustainable\u00a0in this\u00a0report\u00a0declined\u00a0to 62.4\u202fpercent\u00a0compared to\u00a064.5\u202fpercent\u00a0in the\u00a0previous\u00a0report two\u00a0years ago.\u00a0This global figure masks a stark gap between fisheries that are under effective management\u00a0which tend to\u00a0have healthy stocks\u00a0and those that\u00a0aren’t,\u00a0with wide differences\u00a0evident\u00a0across regions and species groups.<\/span>\u00a0
Aquatic\u00a0animal\u00a0foods\u00a0(wild\u00a0caught and\u00a0aquaculture)\u00a0now provide at\u00a0least one-fifth of the animal protein consumption of 3.1 billion people\u00a0and at $184\u00a0billion,\u00a0the\u00a0trade in aquatic animal products now rivals terrestrial meat trade in value.\u00a0So\u00a0protecting aquatic food resources is vital,\u00a0both\u00a0for the oceans and for the humans that depend on them.<\/span>\u00a0
Several areas and species groups\u00a0maintained\u00a0good or improved sustainability records, reflecting continuous implementation of science-based management systems and harvest strategies, but other areas subject to high fishing pressure, strong environmental variability or limited management capacity continue to face persistent challenges.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0
\"\"
Areas with\u00a0very strong\u00a0sustainable\u00a0scores\u00a0included\u00a0the Antarctic Areas\u00a0where\u00a0100 percent of stocks are\u00a0biologically sustainable, followed by\u00a0the Pacific Ocean, particularly in the Northeast Pacific and Southwest Pacific with, respectively, 89.3\u202fpercent and 86.8\u202fpercent of stocks classified as biologically sustainable.\u00a0\u00a0
Areas with high levels of overfishing included the Eastern Central Atlantic with just 47.1\u202fpercent of stocks classed as biologically sustainable and the Mediterranean and Black Sea which had the lowest overall sustainability level with just 45.7\u202fpercent of stocks considered sustainable. \u00a0
Importantly,\u00a0the report\u00a0also\u00a0reveals a more\u00a0encouraging sustainability score: when weighted by volume, 72.6\u202fpercent of 2023 landings of assessed stocks\u00a0monitored\u00a0by FAO are estimated to originate from sustainably fished stocks, confirming that larger and more productive\u00a0stocks tend to be better managed.\u00a0
Reacting to the report, Michael Marriott, MSC program director for AMESA (Africa, Middle\u00a0East\u00a0and South Asia), said:\u00a0
“The FAO’s new data shows very clearly that overfishing continues to be a serious global problem. Overfishing threatens ocean biodiversity,\u00a0livelihoods\u00a0and\u00a0especially food\u00a0security.\u00a0Something\u00a0that\u00a0this report makes\u00a0abundantly\u00a0clear,\u00a0with\u00a0new statistics\u00a0showing\u00a0that\u00a0the\u00a0trade in\u00a0aquatic\u00a0animal\u00a0products\u00a0(wild and farmed)\u00a0now rivals the terrestrial meat trade in value.\u00a0\u00a0
\u201cThe more detailed picture\u00a0of\u00a0overfishing\u00a0levels\u00a0in the report\u00a0gives both cause for hope and a stark warning.\u00a0When\u00a0fisheries are\u00a0well managed,\u00a0they have healthier stocks,\u00a0but\u00a0when management is lacking, stocks suffer. The\u00a0data shows\u00a0us\u00a0that\u00a0sustainable management works but is not being universally applied.\u00a0
“We have\u00a0the solutions: science-based management, catch limits grounded in robust stock assessment, independent verification,\u00a0and an end to illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing. If we want to protect our ocean and its resources, we must act faster and extend these tools and support to the fisheries and regions that need them most.\u00a0Governments, fisheries, scientists, NGOs,\u00a0retailers\u00a0and consumers\u00a0must all work together.\u00a0This report shows exactly where those efforts must be targeted.”\u00a0<\/p>\n

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email editoremail editor by Oliver McBride | Jun 16, 2026 | International Fishing News, Latest NewsMSC responds to FAO report, warning overfishing persists as only 62.4% of stocks are sustainable despite gains in many regions now.The UN’s Food and Agriculture\u00a0Organisation\u00a0(FAO) launched its latest\u00a0State of World Fisheries and Aquaculture\u00a0report at the Our Ocean Conference, in Mombasa, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":24344,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-24343","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24343","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=24343"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24343\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/24344"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=24343"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=24343"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=24343"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}