Explain how overfishing is an example of tragedy of the commons.
Answers
Between the mid-1970s and early 1990s, a series of poor management decisions and inadequate understanding of complex marine ecosystems led to the collapse of the cod fishery, devastation of livelihoods, a flux of environmental refugees, and long-term impacts on the northwest Atlantic ecosystem off the coast of the northern United States and Canada.
The graph below shows the amount of cod captured and taken ashore (fish landings) between 1850 and 2000. The spike in landings beginning around 1960 was caused by innovations in detecting and capturing cod.
How does that relate to the I=PAT equation?
The smaller increase in landings beginning around 1978 follows the Northwest Atlantic Fisheries Organization (NAFO)'s new program to manage fisheries by adopting fish capture quotas and determined minimum mesh sizes. Notice how both attempts to increase landings were short-lived, and today landings are as low as they've ever been.
The term "tragedy of the commons" was coined by Garrett Hardin in his 1968 article published in the journal Science, titled "The Tragedy of the Commons. The idea behind this term refers to the depletion, and ultimately the collapse of a common but limited resource when individuals act selfishly to maximize personal gains. The tragedy of commons term is also closely related to some of the concepts we have covered in previous modules, such as carrying capacity, resilience, and sustainable development.
What happened in the Boston Common is one example of the tragedy of the commons. Another important example of the tragedy of the commons is overfishing. Fish can be found in lakes, oceans, rivers, and streams, which are typically not owned by any one person. Anyone can fish in these places, so the places are “common" and the fish are a common-pool resource. But there is never an infinite supply of fish. Each individual Fisher may want to catch as many fish as he or she can, but if everyone does this, then the supply of fish will be depleted. The depletion is the “tragedy," and it is unsustainable. Eventually, there will be no more fish, and no one will be able to fish anymore. On the other hand, if everyone exercises restraint and doesn’t remove too many fish, then the fish will be able to reproduce, the supply of fish will not become depleted, and fishing can persist indefinitely
Overfishing is a major global issue. Many fish populations have become severely depleted due to overfishing. One example is the population of cod off the Atlantic coast of the United States and Canada