Guidelines for ecological risk assessment of marine fish aquaculture

The purpose of this paper is to exemplify a basic set of guidelines for risk managers and other decision makers to use all information available to assess the different ecological risks of marine fish aquaculture in a variety of marine ecosystems. Ten areas of substantive risk in the interaction between marine fish aquaculture are perceived by the public and public administrators to be of most concern. In this review three of the 10 areas of risk are exemplified for their degree of potential adversity, together with their mitigation, in an identical step-by-step process. These examples outline the approach for conducting a risk assessment for all 10 perceived issues in the paper itself. With the help of a flowchart, the template identifies biological end points or entities and their attributes, both locally and far field, which might be affected for that respective area of risk; and appropriate methodologies that can be used for measuring or monitoring the effects of exposure to each specific risk. The paper also contains a biological overview of some respective risk, and briefly discusses factors that may enhance or mitigate the risk's occurrence. For the benefit of risk managers and risk assessors in all parts of the world, the risks are framed in a matrix to suggest different orders of relevance for their application in different climatic zones.