Relationship Between Marine Fish Production and Climatic and Oceanographic Factors: Evidence From the Bay of Bengal, Bangladesh

Abstract

The fisheries sector is a cornerstone of Bangladesh's economy, contributing significantly to national gross domestic product (GDP) and export earnings. However, the production of other marine fish falls short of national expectations due to various reasons, such as overexploitation, destruction of habitat, pollution, climate change and increasing pressure of poor fishers. This study examines the relationships between marine fish production, and climatic and oceanographic variables along the Cox's Bazar coast in the Bay of Bengal (BoB). Utilizing marine fish production data collected from fish landing centre, and satellite remote sensing data, the study evaluates the relationship between marine fish landing of five different groups and climatic and oceanographic variables. Multiple linear regression (MLR) models were employed to assess these relationships flowing into key analytical steps. The analysis revealed that certain climatic and oceanographic variables, including monthly average precipitation (LnPrecep), relative humidity (LnRhdt), sea surface temperature (LnSST), chlorophyll-A concentration (LnChl), salinity (LnSalinity) and dissolved oxygen (LnDo), have a combined explanatory power of 30.7, 46.10, 30.7, 40.4 and 24.0%, respectively, for the observed variability in monthly landing of five groups of marine fishes (hilsa, chanda, mackerel, rita and mixed) at Bangladesh Fisheries Development Corporation (BFDC)'s fish landing centre of Cox's Bazar. Additionally, these factors explain 38.8% of the variability in the total monthly landing of these five kinds of fishes combined. All the models were found to be statistically significant (p < 0.05). However, the relatively low R² values indicate other unaccounted factors, such as human pressure, particularly the increasing fishing pressure exerted by poor fishers contributing to reduction of marine fish production. These results highlight the relationships of climatic and oceanographic variables, and the volume of fish landings, or marine fish production, in the BoB, emphasizing the need for further research that includes growing fishing pressure to support sustainable marine fisheries management.