The history of fisheries is truly a fascinating one, because for thousands of years man has managed fisheries, in those days the process wasn’t as advanced as it is now, obviously, but the procedure hasn’t changed much, the only thing that has really changed
is the technology that’s used. As we all know fish have always been very important to human society, and as you well know most cities (both in ancient times and in modern times) have always been built along the shoreline, so fish was the go to animal for eating, for leisurely activities and much more. It was easy to catch them and as mankind soon found out, they started to breed them too. Fisheries management was born and it’s a manmade activity stemming from the old fish farms in ancient civilizations and since then fishery management has grown to be a huge industry as well as a prominent scientific field.
Today, we’ll look back at how fisheries management started and how it got here. It all started with the Egyptians, everything seems to have started with the Egyptians, the aristocrats of the time preferred fishing as a leisurely activity, and also it’s important to note that the Egyptians were among the first to start raising fish in captivity, basically they set the stones for fish farming and fisheries management. Nevertheless, we now know for a fact that the Egyptians weren’t the only ones making their own fisheries, we now know of several ancient tribes all over the world that also started this trend in aquatic biology.
From its inception lake or pond and even fisheries management continued to change, almost constantly, with the addition of new techniques. In the Middle Ages for example, we start to see that small fishing communities were actually implementing a new preservation technique, improved forms of transportation also played a vital role in commercial fishing. However, it wasn’t until the Middle Ages were we saw the real birth of commercial fishing; fishing was no longer a local activity, it evolved, large fishing companies were taking the helm. Much like today.
After a couple thousand years went by, we saw that boat designs as well as their construction gradually improved, steam boats were introduced towards the half and last years of the 19th. Century, new gear was coming out as well and even better preservation techniques. It was during this period, a new form of preservation arose, which is canning. When cans were introduced it is important to understand that the manufacturing process was a painstakingly slow, it wasn’t until the industrial revolution that we saw massive outputs in production. Up until now we know and understand that commercial fishing is a pretty big industry in many countries all over the world. And to that end fisheries are very important not only to the local economy but to the global economy itself.
