164,000 and 120,000 years ago. So our love of seafood and its important nutrients goes way back.
According to the World Wildlife Fund, three billion people around the world today depend on wild-caught or farmed seafood as their primary source of protein. Now that’s a whole lot of sushi (and other seafood), and it doesn’t count consumption by the other five billion or so people on the planet. That makes seafood the largest traded food commodity on Earth. But this incredible ocean bounty is being pulled out at unsustainable rates; 90 percent of all fish stocks today are either over-fished or fished to capacity (see Chapters 19 and 21 for details).
To feed the nine or close to ten billion people estimated to populate the planet by 2050, we need to make sure our fisheries are healthy and brimming with fish. According to one estimate (oceana.org/feedtheworld), with the right management and restoration, we could increase global fish stocks by 15 percent, enough fish to feed one billion people a seafood meal every single day.
Contributing Trillions to the Global Economy
Sticking a price tag on the ocean is a real challenge. How would you go about measuring its economic value? Would you use a metric like the one used for countries — gross domestic product (GDP)? And if the value of the ocean could be quantified, would it be considered rich compared to the countries with the biggest economies?
Well, in 2015, the World Wildlife Fund, the Global Change Institute (at the University of Queensland), and the Boston Consulting Group set out to quantify the ocean’s economic value. They did so by adding up the dollar value of the various benefits gained through fisheries, tourism, shipping, and coastal protection from coral reefs and mangroves, to name a few.
This massive analysis concluded that the sea is worth … wait for it … US$24 trillion. That’s trillion, with a “T.” Its annual gross marine product (the equivalent of GDP) was estimated to be US$2.5 trillion a year. That would rank the ocean as the world’s seventh largest economy, sitting between the United Kingdom and Brazil. Maybe, just maybe the ocean should have a seat at the G7 Summit … we’re just sayin’.
Here’s the breakdown from the study:
| Ocean Asset | US$ Trillion |
|---|---|
| Marine fisheries | 2.9 |
| Mangroves | 1.0 |
| Coral reefs | 0.9 |
| Seagrass | 2.1 |
| Shipping lanes | 5.2 |
| Productive coastline | 7.8 |
| Carbon absorption | 4.3 |
| TOTAL | 24 |
Back to the study. The people crunching the numbers admitted to being unable to factor in less tangible benefits of the ocean — you know, little things like producing over half of Earth’s oxygen, anchoring the water cycle, and regulating weather and climate. They didn’t even consider oil and minerals (from offshore drilling and mining), wind power, or the ocean as a source of new medicines. As a result, their estimates represent a vast undervaluation of the ocean’s worth to humanity, let alone all the other living creatures on the planet, but it is a good place to start and underscores just how important the ocean is to our global economy.
Visit www.worldwildlife.org/publications/reviving-the-oceans-economy-the-case-for-action-2015 for additional details from the study.
Serving as a Source of Mystery and Wonder
Since the beginning of time, people have been seduced by the sea, its sound, its power, its vastness, and its creatures, all of which have captivated, enchanted, and inspired humankind. The ocean has served for many generations as muse to some of the world’s greatest authors, inspiring classics such as The Old Man & The Sea, Moby Dick, Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea, Treasure Island, Homer’s Odyssey, The Tempest, and more. Artists have drawn, painted, and sculpted its seascape and creatures, both real and mythical. Musicians have sung of the sea’s soul for millennia. And the ocean plays a prominent role in many religions across the globe.
While it continues to inspire authors and artists, more recently in human history, the ocean has also inspired scientists, and it continues to do so. Exploring the ocean from surface to seafloor and from coastlines to the middle of the deep blue sea not only goes a long way toward satisfying human curiosity, but also uncovers new sources of food, medicines, and energy; provides insight on how to conserve ocean resources; and enhances safety through a better understanding of earthquakes, tsunamis, hurricanes, and other natural threats to human life and property. In addition, the physical challenges of deep-sea exploration often lead to valuable innovations.
In this section, we present some of the ways the ocean feeds the imagination and a few of the more practical benefits of ocean exploration.
Stimulating our imaginations
People always have been and continue to be fascinated with the bizarre, massive, and powerful creatures lurking beneath the ocean’s surface. Before people could explore the underwater world for themselves, they imagined great beasts roaming the ocean, such as the kraken — an enormous octopus-like creature that sailors thought could crush wooden ships whole. Don’t worry, nobody’s going to “release the kraken”; it’s a mythological creature. However, the kraken was probably inspired by a real sea monster — the giant squid, which prowls the deep sea. Females can grow up to 13 meters (43 feet) long (about the length of a school bus) and we think it’s fair to say that a squid of that size would scare the sandals off anyone aboard a boat, wooden or otherwise.
Another favorite marine creature of lore is the mermaid. Half human, half fish, and totally voluptuous, these beautiful sirens would sing out to ships and lure men to love or certain death. Mermaids aren’t real (though I, Ashlan, still love to pretend I am one while scuba diving). They’re believed to have been dreamt up by a bunch of men who were stuck at sea for months and months on end. On the high seas back in the day, women were scarce, and ships were full of dudes with nothing to occupy their free time but rum, stale bread, and tall tales. Historians agree that sailors very likely did see something, maybe a manatee, a dugong, or a sexy seal, but certainly not a mermaid or a lady in a wetsuit. However, after a few glasses of said rum, to a lonely desperate sailor peering through half sober eyes,