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. 2024 Feb 15;15(1):1412.
doi: 10.1038/s41467-024-45556-w.

Effect of trade on global aquatic food consumption patterns

Kangshun Zhao  1   2 , Steven D Gaines  2 , Jorge García Molinos  3 , Min Zhang  4 , Jun Xu  5   6   7
Affiliations

Effect of trade on global aquatic food consumption patterns

Kangshun Zhao et al. Nat Commun. .

Abstract

Globalization of fishery products is playing a significant role in shaping the harvesting and use of aquatic foods, but a vigorous debate has focused on whether the trade is a driver of the inequitable distribution of aquatic foods. Here, we develop species-level mass balance and trophic level identification datasets for 174 countries and territories to analyze global aquatic food consumption patterns, trade characteristics, and impacts from 1976 to 2019. We find that per capita consumption of aquatic foods has increased significantly at the global scale, but the human aquatic food trophic level (HATL), i.e., the average trophic level of aquatic food items in the human diet, is declining (from 3.42 to 3.18) because of the considerable increase in low-trophic level aquaculture species output relative to that of capture fisheries since 1976. Moreover, our study finds that trade has contributed to increasing the availability and trophic level of aquatic foods in >60% of the world's countries. Trade has also reduced geographic differences in the HATL among countries over recent decades. We suggest that there are important opportunities to widen the current focus on productivity gains and economic outputs to a more equitable global distribution of aquatic foods.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no competing interests.

Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1. Global trends of aquatic food production and apparent consumption from 1976 to 2019.
a The global change in per capita consumption of aquatic foods (inc. fish, cephalopods, and crustaceans) and HATL. b The global change in production and trophic level of aquaculture and capture fisheries. The line refers to trophic level, and the envelope refers to production. c Trends of per capita consumption of aquatic foods in different continents. d Trends of HATL in different continents. e The mean country-level per capita consumption of aquatic foods. f The median country-level HATL. HATL human aquatic food trophic level. Countries in gray: No data available.
Fig. 2
Fig. 2. Global aquatic food trade volume and trophic level from 1976 to 2019.
a Trends of aquatic food import and export volume in different continents. b Trends of aquatic food import and export trophic level in different continents. The mean country-level aquatic food import volume (c) and export volume (e). The median country-level aquatic food import trophic level (d) and export trophic level (f). Countries in gray: No data available.
Fig. 3
Fig. 3. Impact of trade on aquatic food consumption per capita and HATL.
a Trends of continental per capita consumption of aquatic foods before and after trade. b The mean country-level change in annual per capita consumption of aquatic foods after trade from 1976 to 2019. c Trends of continental HATL before and after trade. d The mean country-level change in annual HATL after trade from 1976 to 2019. All country-level changes in per capita consumption of aquatic foods and HATL are the post-trade value minus the pre-trade value year by year. Percentage values indicate the proportion of countries affected by trade (positively or negatively) in each region (a, c) and globally (b, d) (for details, see Supplementary Table 2). ‘Before trade’ represents the maximum available live weight per capita of domestically produced aquatic foods, while ‘after trade’ refers to the apparent consumption patterns after completing trade transactions. HATL human aquatic food trophic level. Countries in gray: No data available.
Fig. 4
Fig. 4. Global and regional HATL dispersion before and after trade from 1976 to 2019.
In all plots, each point shows the mean estimate, and error bar shows 95% reference range (mean ± 1.96 SD) for each country. The shaded blue column (before trade) and green column (after trade) indicate the 95% reference range (mean ± 1.96 SD) for all countries in different continents. The dotted lines correspond to the HATL averages of all countries in different continents. Numbers refer to the number of countries in each region (N = 174 total). ‘Before trade’ represents the maximum available live weight per capita of domestically produced aquatic foods, while ‘after trade’ refers to the apparent consumption patterns after completing trade transactions. HATL human aquatic food trophic level.
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