State of World Fisheries and Aquaculture 2004 - Library

World review of fisheries and aquaculture
5
Aquaculture 2002, 1 and that this problem has existed since the early 1990s. Because of
the importance of China and the uncertainty about its production statistics, China, as
in previous issues of this report, is generally discussed separately from the rest of the
world.
Global landings from capture fisheries (Figure 3) remained relatively stable in the
four years 1999–2002. World capture fisheries production in 2002 was 93.2 million
tonnes (84.5 million tonnes marine and 8.7 million tonnes inland), slightly above
production in 2001. After increasing from about 79 million tonnes in 1998 to 87 million
tonnes in 2000, the world marine capture fisheries production decreased to about
84 million tonnes in 2001 and remained at that level in 2002. Inland capture fisheries
production fluctuated slightly around 8.7 million tonnes during 2000–02.
There are considerable variations in marine catches among regions. Between
2000 and 2002, catches decreased in the Northwest and Southeast Pacific, and in the
Eastern Central and Southwest Atlantic, but were still growing in the tropical regions
1
FAO. The State of World Fisheries and Aquaculture 2002. Rome, Box 2, p. 9.