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What is Fisheries Oceanography? Fisheries oceanography can be broadly defined as study of the interaction between marine fish and their environments across multiple life-history stages. Traditional fisheries management approaches estimate population abundance levels as a function of the number of spawning adults without environmental or ecological input, but the field of fisheries oceanography has provided a framework to predict recruitment and define harvest strategies within an ecosystem context. By seeking to elucidate mechanistic relationships between fish species and their surrounding oceanic habitats, the field of fisheries oceanography aims to provide a solid understanding of fish behavior, population dynamics, and life history with an ecosystem perspective.

The social, economic, and ecological consequences of projected climate change on fish and fisheries are issues of global concern. In 2012, the International Council for the Exploration of the Sea (ICES) and the North Pacific Marine Science Organization (PICES) established a Strategic Initiative on Climate Change Effects on Marine Ecosystems (SICCME) to synthesize and to promote innovative, credible, and objective science-based advice on the impacts of climate change on marine ecosystems in the Northern Hemisphere. SICCME takes advantage of the unique and complementary strengths of the two organizations to develop a research initiative that focuses on their shared interests. A phased implementation will ensure that SICCME will be responsive to a rapidly evolving research area while delivering ongoing syntheses of existing knowledge, thereby advancing new science and methodologies and communicating new insights at each phase.