The Relative Risk of Significant Adverse Impacts to Vulnerable Marine Ecosystems in the northeast part of the NPFC’s Convention Area

In 2006, the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) adopted resolution 61/105 to address growing concerns about the impacts to benthic ecosystems by fisheries whose gears contact the seafloor. The Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) outlined criteria to identify vulnerable marine ecosystems (VMEs), undertake impact assessments, and assess for significant adverse impacts (SAIs) to VMEs in its International Guidelines for the Management of Deep-Sea Fisheries in the High Seas (FAO 2009). VMEs are (1) unique or rare, (2) functionally significant habitat, (3) fragile, (4) structurally complex and/or (5) have species with life history traits that make recovery difficult (FAO 2009). The NPFC’s Scientific Committee and its subsidiary groups have taken an active role in addressing the Convention on the Conservation and Management of High Sea Fisheries Resources in the North Pacific Ocean’s mandates related to VMEs and SAIs. The NPFC has not yet developed measurable objectives for determining the occurrence of SAI, and Canada has insufficient data to evaluate the impacts of its bottom fisheries for sablefish. The longline trap and longline hook gear used to harvest sablefish in the NPFC Convention Area (CA) can damage sensitive benthic areas. But a lack of data, including baseline data, to assess the impacts to VMEs by Canada’s sablefish fishery, as well as the timing and magnitude of VME recovery, means that Canada is unable to assess if SAIs have taken place or are likely to take place in the northeastern part of the NPFC’s CA where Canada fishes for sablefish. In this working paper we quantify the relative risk of SAIs on VMEs and areas likely to be VMEs in the Northeastern part of the NPFC’s CA. We focus our assessment specifically along part of the Cobb-Eickelberg seamount chain where most of Canada’s fishing effort for sablefish in the NPFC CA has taken place. Our approach draws on the fishing footprint of Canada’s sablefish fishery and its overlap with the distribution of VMEs and areas likely to be VMEs. We describe the occurrence, spatial scale, and footprint of cumulative fishing activities for sablefish in the NPFC CA. We also describe how these data were used with the distribution of VMEs and areas likely to be VMEs to assess the relative risk of SAIs. We categorize 1 km x 1 km grid cells in our study area into areas at high, medium, or low relative risk of SAI. To fall into the highest relative risk category, both the cumulative fishing footprint and the VME indicator occurrence probability had to have values above the highest thresholds. Most (94%) of the grid cells are in the medium-risk category and 5% are in the high-risk category. High-risk areas are found on Brown Bear, Cobb, and Warwick Seamounts, where cumulative (i.e. summed over time) fishing is greater. Our assessment can be used to inform precautionary management decisions, including spatial closures, to protect VMEs and areas likely to be VMEs from SAIs.