This background paper, prepared by Erik J. Molenaar and Robert Corell for the Arctic TRANSFORM project, focuses on fisheries that occur in the Arctic marine area, including fisheries for anadromous species that spawn in rivers that flow directly into the Arctic marine area. The paper follows a sectoral perspective, but in pursuance of an ecosystem approach to fisheries (EAF). Due to this sectoral perspective, the focus will be exclusively on international instruments and intergovernmental and other relevant international bodies that relate to, or pursue, conservation as well as management. No attention will therefore be paid to those that focus exclusively on conservation of species and habitat by various means, including by the regulation of international trade.

The impact of current and future Arctic fisheries on the marine environment and marine biodiversity in the Arctic is not likely to be fundamentally different from impacts to the marine environment and biodiversity in other parts of the globe. Arctic fisheries could lead to over-exploitation of target species and a variety of impacts on non-target species, for instance on dependent species due to predator-prey relationships, on associated species due to by-catch and on benthic species due to bottom fishing techniques. In view of the broad spatial scope of the Arctic marine area, such undesirable effects are without doubt already occurring, even though not necessarily on a very serious scale.