Growing international and national focus on quantitatively measuring and improving ocean health has increased the need for comprehensive, scientific, and repeated indicators to track progress towards achieving policy and societal goals. The Ocean Health Index (OHI) is one of the few indicators available for this purpose.

Accidental entanglement of turtles in abandoned fshing nets has been, and will likely continue to be, a major threat to sea turtles. Te impact of abandoned or lost nets, also known as ghost nets, can occur far from their point of origin as nets may drif far distances with ocean currents. Turtles that swim through ghost nets may get their body or fippers snagged in the net, potentially leading to lost circulation and injury to fippers, drowning, or prevention from feeding to the point of starvation.

Abrupt shifts in natural resources and their markets are a ubiquitous challenge to human communities. Building resilient social-ecological systems requires approaches that are robust to uncertainty and to regime shifts. Harvesting diverse portfolios of natural resources and adapting portfolios in response to change could stabilize economies reliant on natural resources and their markets, both of which are prone to unpredictable shifts.

Remote polar and deepwater fish faunas are under pressure from ongoing climate change and increasing fishing effort. However, these fish communities are difficult to monitor for logistic and financial reasons. Currently, monitoring of marine fishes largely relies on invasive techniques such as bottom trawling, and on official reporting of global catches, which can be unreliable. Thus, there is need for alternative and non-invasive techniques for qualitative and quantitative oceanic fish surveys.