ICES meets marine historical ecology: placing the history of fish and fisheries in current policy context

As a discipline, marine historical ecology (MHE) has contributed significantly to our understanding of the past state of the marine environment when levels of human impact were often very different fromthose today.What is lesswidely known is that insights fromMHE havemade headway into being applied within the context of present-day and long-term management and policy. This study draws attention to the applied value of MHE.We demonstrate that a broad knowledge base existswith potential formanagement application andadvice, including thedevelopment of baselines and reference levels.Using a number of case studies fromaround theworld,we showcase the value of historical ecology in understanding change and emphasize howit either has already informed management or has the potential to do so soon.We discuss these case studies in a context of the science–policy interface around six themes that are frequently targeted by currentmarine and maritime policies: climate change, biodiversity conservation, ecosystem structure, habitat integrity, food security, and human governance.We encourage science–policy bodies to actively engage with contributions from MHE, as wellinformed policy decisions need to be framed within the context of historical reference points and past resource or ecosystem changes.