Browsing by Author "Bering, Janet"

Now showing 1 - 3 of 3

Open Access
20 Years of Government Responses to the Global Plastic Pollution Problem: The Plastics Policy Inventory
(2020-05-15) Virdin, John; Karasik, Rachel; Vegh, Tibor; Pickle, Amy; Diana, Zoie; Rittschof, Daniel; Bering, Janet; Caldas, Juan
Plastic pollution in the ocean is a global problem that requires cooperation from a wide range of groups (e.g., governments, producers, consumers, researchers, civil society). This study aims to synthesize the policy response of governments to the global plastic pollution problem, as a basis for more rigorous monitoring of progress (as called for in Resolution 4/6 of the 2019 United Nations Environment Assembly (UNEA) meeting) and to inform future public policies.
Open Access
Annual Trends in Plastics Policy: A Brief
(2022-02-23) Karasik, Rachel; Bering, Janet; Griffin, Madison; Diana, Zoie; Laspada, Christian; Schachter, Jonathan; Wang, Yifan; Pickle, Amy; Virdin, John
In 2020, the Plastics Policy Inventory and accompanying report, 20 Years of Government Responses to the Global Plastic Pollution Problem, were published, providing a baseline for the trends in government responses to the plastic pollution problem, as well as highlighting some gaps. Since that time, momentum has grown toward negotiation of an international agreement as a collective response to the problem, even as governments and resources have been strained by the ongoing coronavirus pandemic. This first brief builds upon the 2020 report and baseline by adding new data on national policy responses to plastic pollution from 2020 and 2021. Assessment of the more up-to-date policy inventory suggests that the twenty-year trend of an increase in the number of national policies introduced to reduce plastic pollution has stalled. While additional data on national policies may subsequently become available to revise these estimates, if confirmed they would suggest a pause in government responses to the problem, coinciding with the pandemic (though we cannot show causality). Our goal is for this brief to be the first in a regular series of annual updates on the trends in government responses to the global plastic pollution problem.
Open Access
Assessing Fisheries Effort in Two Dynamic Pelagic Ecosystems
(2022-04-19) Bering, Janet
As human impacts on the global oceans increase, the effective protection of biodiversity and sustainable management of ocean resources has become increasingly important. Complicating these efforts is the fact that sixty-four percent of the surface area of the ocean is beyond national jurisdiction, but many pelagic ecosystems cross between national and international waters. In recent years, there have been efforts to create integrated, area-based management for these transboundary ecosystems, with the Costa Rica Thermal Dome in the Eastern Tropical Pacific Ocean and the Sargasso Sea in the North Atlantic emerging as potential candidates. This MP is a part of a larger project which will create an integrated model of ecology and human impacts, an analysis of existing policies and a set of conclusions aimed at informing and improving governance for each ecosystem. As a preliminary part of this larger analysis, this project characterized the spatial extent of commercial fisheries in each region. Fisheries are one of the largest direct impacts on pelagic ecosystems. The project relied on fishing effort data from Global Fishing Watch, which uses a machine learning algorithm to estimate fishing effort based on vessel track activity. Global Fishing Watch provides the data in an aggregated format, providing total fishing hours from each vessel in 0.1-degree cells. Global Fishing Watch also estimates fishing gear type and provides the flag for each vessel. These data were utilized to characterize fishing effort over six years, 2015–2020. Additionally, this analysis examined drivers of the spatial distribution of this effort. Two drivers were examined: jurisdiction and an environmental variable for each region. The fishing effort was categorized as either on the high seas or within national waters. In the Costa Rica Thermal Dome, water temperature at 35 meters depth was utilized as a proxy for the location of the Dome to see if fishing effort was tracking the upwelling area. In the Sargasso Sea, sea surface temperature was utilized as previous studies have found that sea surface temperature was a primary determinant of the spatial distribution of longlining. In both regions, fishing effort varies both seasonally and across years. In the Costa Rica Thermal Dome, three types of fishing were detected, with tuna purse seine fishing and drifting longline making up 99% of detected fishing effort by hour. Purse seine fishing was detected each year and varied seasonally. Drifting longline fishing increased substantially over the six years, with most of the effort conducted by 13 vessels flagged to Taiwan in 2019 and 2020. In the Sargasso Sea, four types of fishing were detected, with drifting longline making up 98% of detected fishing effort by hour. The analysis revealed that it is likely that multiple environmental and political factors drive the distribution of fishing effort in these two regions. In the Dome, the drifting longlining activity overlapped with the upwelling area while the purse seine fishing did not. In the Sargasso Sea, the drifting longlining fleet distribution appeared to be driven both by flag state and sea surface temperature. In both regions, vessels flagged to the coastal state conducted most of the fishing effort detected in its national waters. A notable exception to this is Costa Rica, where no Costa Rican flagged vessels were detected fishing, but vessels from many other states were. Limitations in the dataset, most notably catch data, make broad conclusions challenging. But these data indicate that it is likely that both political and environmental drivers are driving the spatial distribution of fisheries effort. Future research should consider the synergistic impacts of environmental and political factors in the spatial distribution of high seas commercial fishing effort. Additionally, the increase in drifting longline fishing and absence of squid jigging detected in the regions point to a need for proactive, rather than reactive, management.