Abstract

Bottom trawl fisheries targeting shrimp and halibut generate most of Greenland’s export revenue. However, bottom trawling disturbs the seabed and its invertebrate communities, with effects varying by habitat and being most severe for long-lived sessile epifauna. This study assesses trawling impacts across 461 662 km² of Greenland waters. Greenland fisheries are unusual, as the majority of them operate in deep waters (>200 m). The benthic sensitivity, estimated based on samples from 1510 stations, was high (median longevity 5.6–15.2 years). Generally bottom trawling was spatially patchy: while some small areas showed high bottom trawling intensity, 83% of 1 km² cells were untrawled. We evaluated seabed status using two indicators: RBS_tot (total benthic biomass relative to carrying capacity) and RBS_sen (biomass of the 10% most sensitive taxa relative to carrying capacity). RBS_tot was generally high, and only <0.5 in a small proportion of heavily trawled cells. RBS_sen was consistently lower than RBS_tot and reached zero where swept-area ratio (SAR) ranged from 2 to 5, though this only applied to <1% of the area. High trawling impact on RBS_sen occurred even at low SAR (∼0.3 year⁻¹) in highly sensitive habitats. Despite the high sensitivity, overall trawling impact was limited because of the low mean SAR, compared to more intensively fished regions globally. Nonetheless, some habitats were severely affected, particularly for the most sensitive benthic components. This study presents a spatially explicit, quantitative framework to evaluate trade-offs between fishery production and ecosystem sustainability, offering science-based tools for environmental and fisheries management in Greenland.

Jan Geert Hiddink, Karl B Zinglersen, Sissal Vágsheyg Erenbjerg, Nadescha Zwerschke, Quantifying the impact of bottom trawling on Greenland’s seabed ecosystems, ICES Journal of Marine Science, Volume 83, Issue 6, June 2026, fsag110, https://doi.org/10.1093/icesjms/fsag110