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The Ecosystem Approach to Management (EAM) has emerged over the past decades, largely to promote biodiversity conservation, and more recently sectoral tradeoffs in the management of marine ecosystems. To ascertain the state of practice of EAM operationalization, a workshop was held, which included a pre-workshop online survey. The survey gauged international participants' perspectives regarding capacity, knowledge, and application of EAM. When asked about the subject, most survey respondents had a general understanding of EAM, and provided a clear definition. Major perceived challenges to EAM objectives by those surveyed included limited knowledge, conflicting interests, insufficient communication, and limited organizational legal frameworks or governance structures. Of those directly involved in an ecosystem approach, the majority responded that processes were in place or developed for application of integrated knowledge toward assessing key issues within their respective sectors (i. e. fisheries, conservation, energy), and that capacity was generally high. Our results show that most respondents, irrespective of sector or geography, see value in considering an integrated, broader ecosystem approach as they manage their sector. Although many participants were from the North Atlantic region, our results suggest that much of the international community is converging toward continued understanding of broad-scale, integrated approaches to marine resource management.

The concept of the Ecosystem Approach has entered the fishery harvesting discussions both from fishery perspectives (Reykjavik Declaration; FAO 2003 Annex to the Code of Conduct and from the principles of the Ecosystem Approach adopted by the CBD in 1995. Both perspectives establish the need to maintain ecosystem structure and functioning, whether for sustainable use of biodiversity (CBD) or simply to keep exploited ecosystems healthy and productive (fisheries). In response, the “Balanced Harvest” (BH) concept was suggested by a group of scientists brought together by the IUCN Fisheries Experts Group during the CBD CoP 10 in 2010. The meeting and the BH concept as consolidated there highlighted some of the collateral ecological effects of current fishing patterns and unbalanced removals of particular components of the food web, stimulating a critical rethinking of current approaches to fisheries management. The meeting on “Balanced Harvest in the real world - Scientific, policy and operational issues in an ecosystem approach to fisheries” (Rome, September 29-October 2, 2014) examined the progress made since 2010 on a number of fronts. It considered questions related to the scientific underpinning of the BH concept, including theory, modelling, and empirical observations. It began to explore the economic, policy and management implications of harvesting in a more balanced way.

The concept of the Ecosystem Approach has entered the fishery harvesting discussions both from fishery perspectives (Reykjavik Declaration; FAO 2003 Annex to the Code of Conduct and from the principles of the Ecosystem Approach adopted by the CBD in 1995. Both perspectives establish the need to maintain ecosystem structure and functioning, whether for sustainable use of biodiversity (CBD) or simply to keep exploited ecosystems healthy and productive (fisheries). In response, the “Balanced Harvest” (BH) concept was suggested by a group of scientists brought together by the IUCN Fisheries Experts Group during the CBD CoP 10 in 2010. The meeting and the BH concept as consolidated there highlighted some of the collateral ecological effects of current fishing patterns and unbalanced removals of particular components of the food web, stimulating a critical rethinking of current approaches to fisheries management. The meeting on “Balanced Harvest in the real world - Scientific, policy and operational issues in an ecosystem approach to fisheries” (Rome, September 29-October 2, 2014) examined the progress made since 2010 on a number of fronts. It considered questions related to the scientific underpinning of the BH concept, including theory, modelling, and empirical observations. It began to explore the economic, policy and management implications of harvesting in a more balanced way.

The concept of the Ecosystem Approach has entered the fishery harvesting discussions both from fishery perspectives (Reykjavik Declaration; FAO 2003 Annex to the Code of Conduct and from the principles of the Ecosystem Approach adopted by the CBD in 1995. Both perspectives establish the need to maintain ecosystem structure and functioning, whether for sustainable use of biodiversity (CBD) or simply to keep exploited ecosystems healthy and productive (fisheries). In response, the “Balanced Harvest” (BH) concept was suggested by a group of scientists brought together by the IUCN Fisheries Experts Group during the CBD CoP 10 in 2010. The meeting and the BH concept as consolidated there highlighted some of the collateral ecological effects of current fishing patterns and unbalanced removals of particular components of the food web, stimulating a critical rethinking of current approaches to fisheries management. The meeting on “Balanced Harvest in the real world - Scientific, policy and operational issues in an ecosystem approach to fisheries” (Rome, September 29-October 2, 2014) examined the progress made since 2010 on a number of fronts. It considered questions related to the scientific underpinning of the BH concept, including theory, modelling, and empirical observations. It began to explore the economic, policy and management implications of harvesting in a more balanced way.

The concept of the Ecosystem Approach has entered the fishery harvesting discussions both from fishery perspectives (Reykjavik Declaration; FAO 2003 Annex to the Code of Conduct and from the principles of the Ecosystem Approach adopted by the CBD in 1995. Both perspectives establish the need to maintain ecosystem structure and functioning, whether for sustainable use of biodiversity (CBD) or simply to keep exploited ecosystems healthy and productive (fisheries). In response, the “Balanced Harvest” (BH) concept was suggested by a group of scientists brought together by the IUCN Fisheries Experts Group during the CBD CoP 10 in 2010. The meeting and the BH concept as consolidated there highlighted some of the collateral ecological effects of current fishing patterns and unbalanced removals of particular components of the food web, stimulating a critical rethinking of current approaches to fisheries management. The meeting on “Balanced Harvest in the real world - Scientific, policy and operational issues in an ecosystem approach to fisheries” (Rome, September 29-October 2, 2014) examined the progress made since 2010 on a number of fronts. It considered questions related to the scientific underpinning of the BH concept, including theory, modelling, and empirical observations. It began to explore the economic, policy and management implications of harvesting in a more balanced way.