While fishing supports human populations across the globe and isn’t inherently harmful to the wider world, poor fishing practices can cause lasting harm. How? When more fish get harvested than current populations can produce, a deficit develops. If such deficits continue unabated, fisheries can become economically unviable, endangered, and even extinct.

Sometimes this occurs not due to the specific targeting of a species, but because of incidental and unintentional catches. In addition to the elimination of harmful subsidies, the establishment of technologically advanced fishing methods, fishing rights, and public education can safeguard at-risk fisheries.