Threats to Marine and Coastal Habitats
Coastal development and destructive fishing practices can threaten the basis for healthy fisheries and coastal communities by directly and indirectly altering, removing, and degrading coastal and marine habitats. For instance, from 1982 to 1992, approximately 100,000 acres of wetlands were lost each year, depriving wetland-dependent species such as summer flounder, shrimp, and menhaden of nursery and feeding habitat (CWAP 1998). Likewise, dams along rivers can block fish migratory routes, making it impossible for anadromous species to carry out important life functions, such as spawning.
In combination, habitat loss and degradation, overfishing, and bycatch have led to the designation of nearly half of U.S. marine fisheries as depleted or "overfished" (Status of Fisheries of the United States, 1999). Fishery declines have had severe ramifications on the U.S. economy. The Department of Commerce estimates that fisheries depletion costs the U.S. economy billions of dollars in lost revenue each year. Some portion of that lost revenue and ecological degradation is directly connected to habitat loss.
