Journalist and entrepreneur James Workman and Amanda Leland, executive director of Environmental Defense Fund, present a rare story of ecological recovery with Sea Change: Unlikely Allies and a Success Story of Oceanic Proportions. The concept known as "catch shares" allows fishers proportional shares of a limited quantity of fish to be harvested; the demonstrated outcome improves the health of fisheries as well as the lives and livelihoods of commercial fisherfolk. In an easy-to-read, storytelling style, Workman and Leland detail how this strategy has led to safer and more profitable fishing while helping recover fish populations.
Sea Change wisely focuses on delightful, colorful characters, opening with Keith "Buddy" Guindon, who grew up fishing the Great Lakes and then made a career in Galveston, Tex. Big, brash, a self-described pirate with a "reputation as a grim reaper of the aquatic world," he's an ideal protagonist. "A barrel of a man with amused eyes, a gruff voice and a Santa Claus beard, Buddy is a Galveston legend." Since arriving there in the late 1970s, "he has consistently outmuscled and outfoxed every other fisherman in the western Gulf." An early, outspoken detractor of catch shares, Buddy rapidly morphed into one of its champions, proselytizing across the United States and the world.
From local fisheries to global trends, Sea Change samples best and worst practices to highlight the great promise of catch shares to help both fish populations and the people who rely upon them for livelihoods and nutrition. This accessible study emphasizes galvanizing opportunities to make positive change in myriad other areas of policy and sorely needed optimism in the world of environmental thinking and planning. --Julia Kastner