Consumption and production of proteins derived from animals have more significant environmental and health impacts than proteins derived from plants. This raises concerns mainly in consideration of the predictable increased consumption of animal proteins at the expense of vegetal ones due to growing income, especially in developing countries. Animal protein consumption, and particularly meat consumption, seems to start to decrease at a high level of income, which may suggest that economic growth solves or attenuates the environmental and health problems of animal food consumption. To test this possibility, the relationship between per capita income and animal and vegetal protein consumption is explored. Using a cross-country regression for 142 countries in 2017, animal-based protein, meat protein, and vegetal-based protein consumption are specified as dependent variables. In addition to per capita income, other potential drivers of protein choices, including ecological, demographic and social factors are controlled for. Apart from income, which still seems to be the most important driver of any type of protein consumption, the results suggest that protein consumption from animal sources and meat sources have different determinants. Though there is actually some evidence of an inverted U-shaped relationship between per capita income and animal protein consumption, the peak is at such high levels as to make economic growth irrelevant to curb animal protein consumption.

Context: Contrary to other ocean basins, Indian Ocean catches have increased consistently since 1950, although reported data are known to be incomplete. Fish is a crucial food source in the Indian Ocean; however, ineffective management often empowers over-exploitation. Aims: We synthesised and reviewed Indian Ocean reconstructed catch and effort data by fishing sector and fishing country at the ocean-basin scale. Methods: We aggregated reported and reconstructed unreported catch and effort data for the Indian Ocean and derived catch-per-unit-effort (CPUE) time-series by sector. Key results: Indian Ocean rim country catches dominated in the Indian Ocean. Small-scale catches in the Indian Ocean have grown continuously by over 300% from 1.9 × 106 tonnes (Mg) year-1 in 1950 to 6.5 × 106 tonnes year-1 by 2018. By contrast, total industrial catches from the Indian Ocean have reached a plateau at ~8.5 × 106 tonnes year-1 since the late 1990s, after having steadily risen from very low levels in the early 1960s. Unreported catches declined from 45 to 25% of total catches. Total fishing effort, driven by the industrial sector, has increased 30-fold since 1950 from 0.4 × 109 to 11 × 109 kW-days by 2010, whereas CPUE has declined 78%, with steeper declines in the small-scale (>80% since 1950) than in the industrial sector (65% from its 1981 peak). Conclusions: The different sectoral patterns in the Indian Ocean compared with other ocean basins are likely to be due to the region’s high dependence on small-scale fisheries and the later onset but swift growth of industrial fishing. The declining CPUE suggests strong decreases in stock biomass caused by strongly increasing fishing effort, especially in the industrial sector. Implications: Indian Ocean countries should prioritise lower-impact well-managed domestic small-scale fisheries to maximise long-term, sustainable nutrient supply for local livelihoods.

Harmful, capacity-enhancing subsidies distort fishing activities and lead to overfishing and perverse outcomes for food security and conservation. We investigated the provision and spatial distribution of fisheries subsidies in the Indian Ocean. Total fisheries subsidies in the Indian Ocean, estimated at USD 3.2 billion in 2018, were mostly harmful subsidies (60%), provided to the large-scale industrial sector by mainly a few subsidising countries, including Distant Water Fishing countries. We also explored possible socio-economic drivers of the composition of subsidies, and show that the extent of harmful subsidies provided by Indian Ocean Rim (IOR) countries to their industrial sector can be predicted by the seafood export quantities of these countries. These results illustrate the inequity in accessing fisheries resources for the small-scale sector of nutrient insecure and ocean-dependant IOR countries. The present study can benchmark future assessments and implementation of fisheries subsidy disciplines in the region following the World Trade Organisation Agreement on Fisheries Subsidies.

Marine ecosystem functions are affected by climate change impacts such as ocean warming, deoxygenation and acidification. These impacts drive changes in distributions and body size of fish species and directly affect fisheries. Wild-capture fisheries are crucial for providing nutrients, livelihoods, and employment in tropical Southeast Asia and Pacific Island countries, where coastal communities are highly vulnerable to climate change. We examined the impacts of climate change on fish stocks and nutrient availability of seven key micronutrients (calcium, Omega-3 fatty acids, iodine, iron, vitamin A, vitamin B12 and zinc) in Southeast Asia, Pacific Islands, and Oceania (Australia and New Zealand). We combined micronutrient demands by local human populations with Sea Around Us reconstructed catch time series and catch projections from a dynamic bioclimate envelope model for the 21st century. The model predicted a decline in the Maximum Catch Potential (MCP) within Exclusive Economic Zones for Oceania, Pacific Islands, and Southeast Asian countries. Under the 'strong mitigation' scenario, catch potential reductions ranged from a decline of 54-66 % in Oceania, 58-92 % in Pacific Islands, and 65-86 % in Southeast Asia by the mid to the end of the 21st century relative to the historical period, respectively. Under the 'no-mitigation' climate scenario, reductions were more severe, with a decline of 55-70 % in Oceania, 66-92 % in Pacific Islands, and 70-86 % in Southeast Asia for the same time periods. Our findings indicate that Australia and New Zealand are unlikely to meet the recommended nutrient intake demand for most micronutrients through their fisheries (not considering trade or aquaculture production), except for iodine and vitamin B12. Pacific Island countries will likely follow the same pattern while Southeast Asia is expected to face worsening deficits, except for iodine and vitamin B12. This study highlights the importance of incorporating nutritional considerations of seafood into national food, trade and economic policies.

The exceptional diversity of shallow‐water marine fishes contributes to the nutrition of millions of people worldwide through coastal wild‐capture fisheries, with different species having diverse nutritional profiles. Fishes in ecosystems are reservoirs of micronutrients with benefits to human health. Yet, the amount of micronutrients contained in fish species on coral reefs and in shallow tropical waters is challenging to estimate, and the micronutrients caught by fisheries remain uncertain. To assess whether micronutrient deficiencies could be addressed through specific fisheries management actions, we first require a quantification of the potentially available micronutrients contained in biodiverse reef fish assemblages. Here, we therefore undertake a broad heuristic assessment of available micronutrients on tropical reefs using ensemble species distribution modelling and identify potential mismatches with micronutrients derived from summarising coastal fisheries landings data. We find a mismatch between modelled estimates of micronutrients available in the ecosystem on the one hand and the micronutrients in small‐scale fisheries landings data. Fisheries had lower micronutrients than expected from fishes in the modelled assemblage. Further, fisheries were selective for vitamin A, thus resulting in a trade‐off with other micronutrients. Our results remained unchanged after accounting for the under‐sampling of fish communities and under‐reporting of small‐scale fisheries catches—two major sources of uncertainty. This reported mismatch indicates that current estimates of fished micronutrients are not adequate to fully assess micronutrient inventories. However, small‐scale fisheries in some countries were already selective towards micronutrient mass, indicating policies that target improved access, distribution and consumption of fish could leverage this existing high micronutrient mass. Enhanced taxonomic resolution of catches and biodiversity inventories using localised species consumption surveys could improve understanding of nature‐people linkages. Improving fisheries reporting and monitoring of reef fish assemblages will advance the understanding of micronutrient mismatches, which overall indicate a weak uptake of nutritional goals in fisheries practices. The decoupling between micronutrients in ecosystems and in fisheries catches indicates that social, economic, and biodiversity management goals are not shaped around nutritional targets—but this is key to achieve a sustainable and healthy planet for both people and nature. Read the free Plain Language Summary for this article on the Journal blog.

Seafood from marine fisheries, such as finfishes and invertebrates, is an important source of nutrients for billions of people globally. Seafood species vary in their micronutrient concentration, their economic value, and their vulnerability to exploitation and climate change. However, fisheries management has rarely considered the nutritional quality of fisheries catches and their relation to economic, conservation and climate vulnerability dimensions. Here, we quantified and analysed the micronutrient supply and average micronutrient concentration of taxa exploited by fisheries in the Indian Ocean. We also assessed associations among taxon‐specific micronutrient concentrations, ex‐vessel prices, fishing vulnerability and climate vulnerability. We found that small pelagic finfishes, despite contributing little to the overall catch weight, were particularly rich in micronutrients, were resilient and low priced, highlighting their utility in food and nutritional security. In contrast, taxa such as tunas and cephalopods were less nutrient‐dense, more vulnerable and had higher ex‐vessel prices. Results also showed differences in catch micronutrient concentrations between countries within the Indian Ocean Rim (IOR) and Distant Water Fishing (DWF) countries. IOR country catches were dominated by taxa richer in calcium, omega‐3 fatty acids and iron but with higher climate vulnerability. DWF catches, which accounted for only 2% of the Indian Ocean's total micronutrient supplies, were relatively richer in selenium, more vulnerable to fishing and had higher ex‐vessel prices. Our results highlight the trade‐offs and synergies among nutritional, economic, conservation and climate resilience dimensions of Indian Ocean fisheries, providing key insights for nutrition‐sensitive fisheries management strategies aimed at balancing multiple priorities.