Ecosystem-Scale Biodiversity in Fisheries Life Cycle Impact Assessment

The impact of fisheries
was recently operationalised in Life Cycle
Assessment, accounting for effects on individual exploited species
at both regional and global scales. Now, this emergent pathway is
expanded to the ecosystem scale by incorporating additional indirect
impacts associated with fishing through the integration of ecosystem
dynamics. The methodology combines a novel coupling of dynamic ecosystem
modeling and species sensitivity distribution curves to quantify fisheries
effects on marine biodiversity, using an adaptation of the USEtox
effect factor modeling that assesses community-scale ecotoxicity impacts.
Innovative elements include the incorporation of indirect effects
through a fished community via predator–prey interactions,
and a bidirectional threshold interval that captures both potential
population depletion and expansion dynamics resulting from exploitation.
A proof of concept is presented in the Adriatic Sea, deriving novel
midpoint characterization factors for 26 exploited functional groups,
with impacts reported in potentially affected fraction (PAF) units.
Impact values are spread over 6 orders of magnitude (1.58× 10–7 PAF small/medium rays −2.16 × 10–1 PAF small pelagic fish), validating the operability
of the approach. Methodological choices and assumptions introduced
by the novel approach are discussed. The original combination of modeling
tools employed in this characterization approach contributes to the
progressive enhancement of the fisheries impact pathway and how biodiversity
loss is considered in life cycle impact assessment.