One hundred and thirty five years ago, when the Marine Biological Association was founded at a meeting at the Royal Society in London, it was agreed to establish a laboratory at Plymouth with one of the key aims being to support the improvement in the effectiveness of fishing industry through the ‘investigation of the habits and organisation of the fisheries of our British waters’ (Anon 1887). Such endeavor in an international context is still of prime importance today. Our world population is projected to exceed 9 billion by 2050 and the gap in potential protein production for this world population increase has been emphasized (Godfray et al. Reference Godfray, Beddington, Crute, Haddad, Lawrence, Muir, Pretty, Robinson, Thomas and Toulmin2010). Over recent decades this has led to increasing exploitation of food from the sea with the global production of fish increasing eight-fold since 1950 (Béné et al. Reference Béné, Barange, Subasinghe, Pinstrup-Andersen, Merino, Hemre and Williams2015). Both fishing and aquaculture has contributed to this increased production. The effect of human diet on production of greenhouse gas emissions and consequent effects on climate change has been highlighted (Tilman and Clark Reference Tilman and Clark2014). Diets including fish rather than other animal proteins ameliorate such emissions and fish also has excellent nutritional qualities giving even further impetus to increasing fish production (Tilman and Clark Reference Tilman and Clark2014, Béné et al. Reference Béné, Barange, Subasinghe, Pinstrup-Andersen, Merino, Hemre and Williams2015).

However, concerns have been expressed regarding the sustainability of fisheries in terms of serial overexploitation of fish stocks. Possible strategies for dealing with this require improved knowledge of individual stocks and the food webs of which they are part (Pauly et al. Reference Pauly, Christensen, Guénette, Pitcher, Sumaila, Walters, Watson and Zeller2002). Such information is provided in this issue for the edible rock oyster (Saccostrea cucullata) (Singh Reference Singh2019), the white shrimp (Litopenaeus schmitti) (Silva et al. Reference Silva, Calazans, Nolé, Soares, Frédou and Peixoto2019) and the Japanese jack mackeral (Trachurus japonicas) (Sassa et al. Reference Sassa, Kitajima, Nishiuchi and Takahashi2019). Arrighetti et al. (Reference Arrighetti, Teso, Brey and Penchaszadeh2019) give insights into the foodweb which supports the fisheries of a sub-tidal sandy ecosystem of the Mar del Plata off Argentina. A further aspect of maintaining production from the sea has been increasing utilisation of previously less desirable species (Pauly et al. Reference Pauly, Christensen, Guénette, Pitcher, Sumaila, Walters, Watson and Zeller2002). Balogh et al. (Reference Balogh, Wolfe and Byrne2019) provide valuable information of the reproductive biology of the sea cucumber Stichopus herrmanni. This ecologically important holothurian, in common with other similar species, is increasingly being exploited for the trade in ‘bêche-de-mer’.

Salmon farming is a well-researched and successful aquacultural enterprise. In this issue Kintner and Brierly (Reference Kintner and Brierley2019) document the effects on farmed fish of hydrozoan blooms on the north-west coast of Scotland, a previously unrecognised hazard to this longstanding industry. In contrast the abalone Haliotis tuberculata has traditionally been harvested from natural stocks. Recently, however, the species is being farmed. Key to effective management of farmed animals will be a thorough knowledge of their physiology. Chapperon et al. (Reference Chapperon, Clavier, Dugué, Amice, Le Goff and Roussel2019) provide us with detailed information on respiration, calcification and excretion rates of this newly domesticated species.

Thus in keeping with one of the original aims of the Marine Biological Association the Journal welcomes and continues to publish papers pertaining to the topic of ‘food from the sea’ both in respect of fishing and aquaculture research.