The Barents Sea

Fisheries in the North Atlantic, southeast Atlantic, and eastern central Atlantic reached their maximum production levels one or two decades ago and are now showing a declining trend in total catches (1). The declining catches are consistent with observations that these areas have the highest incidence of overexploited stocks, depleted stocks or slowly recovering stocks that have been depleted by overfishing. Excessive fishing pressure has resulted not only in a loss in total production, but has also had a significant social and economic impact. A recent study suggested that 80 – 90% of the worldwide large marine fish predators have been lost due to exploitation (2, 3). Freshwater and marine habitats are also being destroyed by pollution, infrastructure development, and human settlements. There is therefore, growing public concern regarding the declining condition of the world's aquatic environment as a consequence of the impact of human activities. This concern has resulted in increasing pressure on decision makers to establish new and innovative policies that can be deployed in order to reverse those negative trends. The management of marine resources is a very complex task, and the scientific knowledge required for a cross-sectorial approach that integrates environmental, socioeconomic, and developmental requirements is often lacking or unavailable to policy makers. The United Nations Environmental Program, UNEP, recognized this deficiency and, to fill the current gap in scientific knowledge of the aquatic ecosystem, initiated the Global International Waters Assessment, (GIWA). A cooperation agreement was established between UNEP-GIWA and the Russian Academy of Science, (RAS), and, with the Murmansk Marine Biology Institute as the leading institution of the project. Overexploitation of aquatic living resources is one of the main concerns of the GIWA. This article presents background material together with a historical assessment of fish resources of the main Russian seas, Barents and Azov Seas, assembled within the GIWA project.