Fishing ban
45 cases in 38 countries, 1840–2025. Most cases: United States (8), Canada (4), Spain (3), Peru (3), Russia (3).
Octopus farm project (Nueva Pescanova, Canary Islands)
Nueva Pescanova proposed an octopus farm in the Canary Islands. A July 2026 headline in Diario de Avisos stated that no octopus farm would be built there.
Alaska flatfish trawl fishery recertified by MSC for third time
The Marine Stewardship Council recertified Alaska's bottom-trawl flatfish fishery for a third time in December 2025. A tuna fleet was also recertified despite criticism from a UK parliamentary committee over shark-fin evidence.
Antarctic krill fishing near penguin colonies
Press reports say that in 2024 a rule spreading krill fishing across Antarctic areas lapsed and the catch concentrated near penguin colonies. The fishing industry says krill is healthy and the catch is under 1% of biomass.
Dominica passes law for sperm whale reserve; carbon claim has no credit scheme
Dominica set up a sperm whale reserve whose law does not tie it to carbon credits. Scientists have disputed the carbon estimates behind the whale-credit idea, and the cited sources show no whale carbon credit sold.
Lake Tefé reaches 39.5 °C in 2023; 209 dolphins die
Revista Pesquisa FAPESP reported that Lake Tefé in the Amazon reached 39.5 °C in 2023, and that 209 dolphins died. The cited sources do not state the cause of the deaths.
Australia and Tuvalu sign Falepili Union with annual ballot for migration visas
Under a 2023 treaty, Australia recognised Tuvalu's statehood independent of climate impacts and offers 280 visas a year by ballot as sea levels rise. Tuvalu's fixed maritime boundaries underpin fishing-licence income of about USD 30 million a year.
MSC certification of Pacific purse-seine tuna faces repeated disputes
The Marine Stewardship Council certified the Pacific tuna purse-seine fishery, and an independent adjudicator halted a fish-aggregating device (FAD) expansion in 2022. Drifting FADs catch juvenile bigeye and wash ashore, so certification decisions affect tuna stocks and coasts.
Peru counts 529,400 guano seabirds as it approves a seven-year-high anchovy quota
Peru counted 529,400 guano seabirds in January 2025, down from about 4 million in 2022, and authorities approved a seven-year-high anchovy quota that year. At stake are the seabird colonies and the anchovy stock.
MSC certification of Australian orange roughy trawl fishery
An Australian deep-sea trawl fishery for orange roughy was certified by the Marine Stewardship Council in February 2025, after an independent adjudicator had upheld an objection against an earlier assessment in January 2021. MSC narrowed its objections process the same month.
Yangtze ten-year fishing ban
About 231,000 fishers put down their nets. Studies attribute about 70% of the river's fish loss to habitat destruction, mostly dams, sand mining and land reclamation.
British Columbia's 13.2 million hectare old-growth count is challenged
The provincial government counts 23 percent of its forest as old growth. An independent 2020 report said only 3 percent of the province can grow big trees, and The Narwhal reported in 2024 that 2.4 million hectares were temporarily deferred.
US Southeast shrimp skimmer-trawl turtle excluder device rule (2019) and the Louisiana Shrimp Association litigation
A final rule of 20 December 2019 requires turtle excluder devices on skimmer trawls of 40 ft and longer. The Louisiana Shrimp Association sued in January 2024; the district court dismissed on 27 June 2025 and the Fifth Circuit affirmed on 28 August 2026.
Mexico reported 7.2 million pesos for vaquita protection diverted
Excélsior reported in 2018 that 7.2 million pesos meant for vaquita protection had been diverted. What is at stake is the survival of the vaquita, of which a summary says 7 to 10 animals remain.
Bottom trawling in European marine protected areas
A 2018 study of 727 marine protected areas designated by EU member states found commercial bottom trawling in at least 59% of them. Reports from 2024 and 2025 say trawling continued, while the European Commission's 2030 phase-out target for protected areas remained non-binding.
North Atlantic right whale deaths and US vessel-speed rule withdrawal
NOAA maintains an Unusual Mortality Event page for North Atlantic right whales covering 2017 to 2026. A news report carried the headline that NOAA had withdrawn a proposed rule requiring ships to slow down.
Baikal omul industrial fishing ban (from 2017)
Russia banned industrial fishing of Baikal omul by Ministry of Agriculture Order No. 450 of 29 August 2017, in force from 1 October 2017, citing a decline in the population. The ban remained in force in October 2026 with no reopening date set.
Kiribati PIPA opened to fishing
The Phoenix Islands Protected Area, 408,250 square kilometres of ocean, was closed to commercial fishing in 2015. In November 2021 the Government of Kiribati announced it would end the closure, and the area opened formally in 2023.
Palau National Marine Sanctuary
Palau closed 80% of its exclusive economic zone to fishing under a 2015 law that took effect in 2020. Proposals to reopen part of it have been tabled since 2022.
Kiribati opens Phoenix Islands protected area to fishing; trust dissolved
Kiribati's Phoenix Islands Protected Area, closed to commercial fishing in 2015, was opened to fishing again in November 2021. IUCN reports that the fishing-ban area shrank to about 3% of the protected area and that the compensation trust was dissolved.
Thunder fishing vessel chase
Sea Shepherd pursued the fishing vessel Thunder for what it calls 110 days in 2014–15 until the ship sank off São Tomé and Príncipe. Three of its officers were convicted there, and its owner was fined in Spain in 2018.
Former Chilean senator and Corpesca convicted over bribery tied to fisheries law
In December 2020 Santiago's Third Oral Criminal Court convicted former senator Jaime Orpis of bribery and fraud against the state, and the fishing company Corpesca of bribery, over payments made while the fisheries law was debated. The law remains in force, with free fleet quotas for industrial vessels, and artisanal fishers lost out.
Mediterranean fisheries bycatch of sea turtles: GFCM rules of 2011 and 2021 and a Tunisian fisher study
A review cited in a 2019 paper gives more than 132,000 sea turtles caught per year in the Mediterranean, all species. The General Fisheries Commission for the Mediterranean adopted a landing and release rule in 2011 and a mitigation recommendation in 2021, and a 2023 Tunisian study named ray nets, trawls and pelagic longlines as the main threats.
Pacific tuna Vessel Day Scheme
Pacific island states that are parties to the Nauru Agreement sell fishing days to tuna fleets, and their access revenue rose from US$64 million in 2010 to US$357 million in 2015. Catch reached a record in 2024, the fishery's certificate was widened in 2024, and Kiribati's Phoenix Islands protected area was reopened to fishing.
Taiji dolphin drive hunt
In the town of Taiji, Japan, dolphins are driven into a cove each season; some are killed and some are captured alive. Advocacy groups report that the live animals are sold to aquariums and marine parks, including parks in China.
Mauritania fishmeal industry, sardinella stocks and foreign fishing agreements
Mauritania's fishmeal plants grew from fewer than three in 2008 to 44 authorised plants in 2021, while a 2024 FAO/CECAF assessment placed round and flat sardinella in a critical, heavily overexploited state. The country received EUR 60.8 million a year from the EU under its 2021–2026 fisheries protocol and signed a 25-year fishing agreement with a Chinese company.
Hawaii shallow-set longline swordfish fishery: loggerhead interaction limits, Ninth Circuit ruling and 2018 closure
The Hawaii-based shallow-set longline fishery was reauthorised in 2004 with a limit of 17 loggerhead interactions a year. In 2017 the Ninth Circuit held NMFS's 2012 no-jeopardy finding for loggerheads arbitrary and capricious; a May 2018 settlement closed the fishery for the rest of that year, and a 2019 opinion and 2020 rule set new limits.
Banc d'Arguin National Park, the BACoMaB trust fund and fishing pressure
The BACoMaB conservation trust fund, capitalised by KfW, AFD/FFEM, MAVA and the EU through fisheries-agreement sectoral support, finances part of the running costs of Banc d'Arguin National Park in Mauritania. The park's 2024 dashboard records rising landings of threatened sharks and rays by its resident fishers, and a 2023 study found bony fish stocks inside the park overfished.
US Atlantic pelagic longline fishery: loggerhead take limits, Northeast Distant area reopened to circle hooks (2004) and Oceana v. Gutierrez (2007)
NMFS learned in 2003 that its take statement for loggerheads may have been exceeded in 2002. A 6 July 2004 rule reopened the Northeast Distant area to vessels using circle hooks, and the D.C. Circuit affirmed for the government on 1 June 2007.
California and Oregon drift gillnet fishery: Pacific Loggerhead Conservation Area and the SB 1017 buyout
A 2000 biological opinion found the drift gillnet fishery likely to jeopardise loggerheads. NMFS closed an area to the fishery in June–August during El Niño conditions from 2004, and California's SB 1017 of 27 September 2018 phases out swordfish drift gillnets through a buyout.
Caspian sturgeon and caviar: trade suspensions, fishing bans and the move to farmed caviar
Legal Caspian sturgeon catch fell from about 22,000 tonnes in the late 1970s to about 1,100 tonnes in the late 1990s, according to TRAFFIC. CITES published wild-caviar export quotas for the last time for 2010–11, the five Caspian states have renewed a commercial fishing ban each year since 2017 (covering 2026), and farms now supply the legal caviar.
South African west coast rock lobster quota and WWF court case
In September 2018 the Western Cape High Court found the 2017/18 west coast rock lobster quota unlawful and unconstitutional. The stock was at about 2% of its pre-exploitation level.
Cabo Pulmo National Park (Mexico) community no-take success
A village of about 100 people stopped fishing on its own reef in 1995. A peer-reviewed measurement found fish biomass rose from 0.75 to 4.24 tonnes per hectare between 1999 and 2009, while control areas did not change.
Namibia landed thousands of tonnes of pilchard as bycatch under moratorium
Pilchard bycatch of 12,610 tonnes was landed in 2024 under a moratorium meant to protect the stock. Whether the stock is recovering is disputed, so the closure's effect on the species is not established.
Northern cod collapse, reopening and Little Bay Islands (Newfoundland)
Canada stopped the northern cod fishery on 2 July 1992 and reopened it commercially in 2024 after a stock-model update; the quota was raised in 2025. In between, the Newfoundland village of Little Bay Islands emptied and closed under a provincial resettlement programme.
Whaling after the moratorium (Japan, Norway, Iceland)
The International Whaling Commission adopted a moratorium on commercial whaling in 1982, in force from 1986. Whaling by Japan, Norway and Iceland continued in later decades, and recovery has differed widely between whale populations.
Save the Whales campaign and IWC whaling moratorium
A 1971 campaign by the Animal Welfare Institute and allies led to a 1982 International Whaling Commission moratorium on commercial whaling. The cited sources describe uneven recovery, continued whaling by some countries and unpunished unreported Soviet catches.
Newfoundland and Labrador community resettlement programmes
Since the 1950s the province has paid residents of small coastal communities to move, and in recent decades it has weighed each closure against twenty years of service costs. The northern cod fishery, banned from 1992, reopened in 2024 under a quota that critics questioned.
Nile perch released in Lake Victoria in 1954 linked to loss of 200+ cichlids
Uganda's colonial-era fisheries officers released Nile perch into Lake Victoria in 1954, and the IUCN database names it a main cause of the loss of 200 or more endemic cichlid species. At stake for nature is the lake's endemic cichlid fauna.
Peru seizes Onassis whaling fleet (1954)
In November 1954 the Peruvian navy seized ships of Aristotle Onassis's whaling fleet, including the factory ship Olympic Challenger, for whaling inside the 200-mile zone declared by Peru, Chile and Ecuador. A magazine profile kept in the CIA reading room says Onassis paid Peru a $3 million fine that Lloyd's covered; no other source confirms the amount.
Cheynes Beach whaling station near Albany closes in 1978
The Cheynes Beach whaling station at Albany, Australia, closed in 1978.
Soviet whaling catches and the reports to the IWC, 1948–1979
Researchers at NOAA and collaborators estimate that Soviet fleets killed 534,119 whales from 1933 into the 1970s, of which 178,726 were not reported to the International Whaling Commission. The IWC adopted Resolution 1994-6 in May 1994, which contains no penalty or compensation.
Pribilof fur seal harvest and Alaska Commercial Company
The Alaska Commercial Company held the Pribilof Islands fur seal harvest in the late nineteenth century. A federal agency history records that the Aleut residents were later compensated by the US government, not by the company.
Lessepsian invasions: pufferfish in Turkey and bounty payments
Since the Suez Canal opened in 1869, hundreds of Red Sea species have entered the Mediterranean. On the Turkish coast, fishers report net damage from pufferfish, and the state pays a bounty for each one removed.
Whale oil, kerosene and the 1986 whaling moratorium
A widely repeated account says kerosene replaced whale oil and saved the whales. Reported research puts the large-whale kill at about 2.9 million in the twentieth century, after kerosene was widespread, and ties the end of most commercial whaling to the international ban in effect from 1986.
Peruvian guano trade and the Gibbs family
Peru exported guano from its coastal islands from the 1840s and later defaulted on its debts. A British estate bought with guano wealth was acquired by the National Trust in 2002 with a public grant of GBP 17.425 million. Guano bird numbers stood at 529,400 in January 2025.