Evaluation of Sustainable Utilization of African Marine Fishery Resources

Abstract

Sustainable utilization evaluation is the basis for ensuring the sustainable exploitation of fisheries’ resources. This paper explores the changes in the mean trophic level of African marine fish catches during a 70-year period based on the statistical data on marine fisheries’ catches in Africa from 1950–2019, provided by the FAO in, order to determine the sustainable utilization of Africa’s fishery resources. The results indicate that although the marine fishery resources of African coastal countries have great variability, their exploitation has roughly gone through the stages of under-exploitation, rapid exploitation, and over-exploitation. Currently, marine fisheries in North and Central Africa are characterized by sustainable exploitation, while East, West, and Southern Africa are in a state of overfishing. The study implicates that African countries should establish a real-time monitoring system for marine fishery resources as soon as possible in order to dynamically grasp the actual changes in fish community structure due to fishing activities, ensure transparency in management and decision making, enact marine regulations to restrict massive fishing by overseas fleets, issue fisheries licenses cautiously, adopt conservative resource conservation policies, and enforce actions to achieve sustainable fisheries development.