Impact of warmer seas on fish stocks leads to rise in pirate attacks
Dwindling fish stocks caused by the climate crisis are leading to an increase in pirate attacks, according to a new study looking at two piracy hotspots over the past two decades.
Warmer seas have negatively affected fisheries in east Africa, one of the world’s worst areas for piracy; while in the South China Sea, another hotspot for attacks, it has had the opposite effect: fish populations have risen.
This phenomenon created a “rare natural experiment” in which to test the links between climate breakdown and piracy risk, according to Gary LaFree, a professor of criminology and criminal justice at the University of Maryland, and one of the co-authors of the paper, published in the American Meteorological Society journal, Weather, Climate, and Society (WCAS).
“We wanted to test the hypothesis: does piracy increase when fish production declines and decrease when fish production increases?” said LaFree. The answer, they found, was yes. “We did a multi-varied analysis to see whether the underlying theory was statistically significant and it is.”
The study, which looked at more than 2,000 attacks in east Africa and the South China Sea over the past 20 years, found the trends in piracy were linked to the impact of warmer seas on fish stocks.
In east Africa, where fish populations are declining due to warmer seas, piracy rates have increased. But rising sea temperature had the opposite effect in the South China Sea. There, fish populations have increased and piracy rates have declined.
“In a timeline of roughly 20 years, we’re picking up statistically significant, measurable differences,” LaFree said. “I was surprised by how rapidly those changes are occurring, especially when you think of climate change most likely accelerating in
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