The Past and Future of the Fisheries and Marine Ecosystem Model
Intercomparison Project
Abstract
Climate-driven ecosystem changes are increasingly affecting the world’s
ocean ecosystems, necessitating urgent guidance on adaptation strategies
to limit or prevent catastrophic impacts. The Fisheries and Marine
Ecosystem Model Intercomparison Project (FishMIP) is a network and
framework that provides standardised ensemble projections of the impacts
of climate change and fisheries on ocean life and the benefits that it
provides to people through fisheries. Since its official launch in 2013
as a small, self-organised project within the larger Inter-Sectoral
Impact Model Intercomparison Project, the FishMIP community has grown
substantially and contributed to key international policy processes,
such as the IPCC AR5 and AR6, and the IPBES Global Biodiversity
Assessment. While not without challenges, particularly around comparing
heterogeneous ecosystem models, integrating fisheries scenarios, and
standardising regional-scale ecosystem models, FishMIP outputs are now
being used across a variety of applications (e.g., climate change
targets, fisheries management, marine conservation, Sustainable
Development Goals). Over the next decade, FishMIP will focus on
improving ecosystem model ensembles to provide more robust and
policy-relevant projections for different regions of the world under
multiple climate and societal change scenarios, and continue to be open
to a broad spectrum of marine ecosystem models and modellers. FishMIP
also intends to enhance leadership diversity and capacity-building to
improve representation of early- and mid-career researchers from
under-represented countries and ocean regions. As we look ahead, FishMIP
aims to continue enhancing our understanding of how marine life and its
contributions to people may change over the coming century at both
global and regional scales.