How subsidies affect the economic viability of small-scale fisheries

This article presents the first bottom-up analysis of the proportion of global marine fisheries subsidies to small-scale fisheries (SSF). Using existing data, the reported national subsidy amounts are split into the fraction that goes to small- and large-scale fishing sectors. Results reveal a major imbalance in subsidy distribution, with SSF receiving only about 16% of the total global fisheries subsidy amount of $35 billion in 2009. To bring this into perspective, a person engaged in large-scale fishing received around 4 times the amount of subsidies received by their SSF counterparts. Furthermore, almost 90% of capacity-enhancing subsidies, which are known to exacerbate overfishing go to large-scale fisheries, thus increasing the unfair competitive advantage that large-scale fisheries already have. The developmental, economic and social consequences of this inequity are huge and impair the economic viability of the already vulnerable small-scale fishing sector. Conclusions indicate that taxpayers' money should be used to support sustainable fishing practices and in turn ocean conservation, and not to foster the degradation of marine ecosystems, often a result of capacity-enhancing subsidies. Reducing capacity-enhancing subsidies will have minimal negative effects on SSF communities since they receive very little of these subsidies to begin with. Instead, it will help correct the existing inequality, enhance SSF economic viability, and promote global fisheries sustainability.     

基于面板数据的我国海洋渔业经济的影响因素

本研究选取海洋渔业固定资产投资额、海洋渔业劳动力数量、海洋捕捞生产率和海水养殖生产率4个变量,提出影响因素假设;选取我国沿海地区海洋渔业的面板数据,进行模型设定和数据检验。通过确定变截距固定效应的回归模型形式,对模型进行估计和分析,结果表明:海洋渔业固定资产投资额、海洋渔业劳动力数量和海水养殖生产率与海洋渔业经济呈正相关,影响度由大到小依次为劳动力因素、资本因素和生产率因素,而海洋捕捞生产率的影响基本不显著;各地区海洋渔业经济发展程度不一,且差距明显。在此基础上,提出促进我国海洋渔业经济发展的对策建议:加强专业人才集聚;提高资本投入,完善资本市场建设;提高海水养殖生产率,数量和品质兼备;推动区域一体化联动发展。     

Own-price elasticity of open access supply as a long-run measure of fish stock abundance

Extensive criticisms of the management of marine fisheries periodically arise for a variety of reasons. While the complexity of the US fisheries management process is partially to blame, these reasons manifest themselves in statements that include a perceived decline in living marine resource abundance levels, a proposed change in the regulatory infrastructure, or improvements in stock abundance that some feel should allow for new entrants. Following these criticisms are calls to end the federal management process or at the very least the replacement of the fishery management agency leadership. These demands driven by rent seeking behavior use short-term declines in abundance as justification when the long-run abundance measures would have indicated improvements in stock abundance and achievement of management objectives. Empirical, long-run, stock abundance indices are estimated using synthetic demand methodology, based on bioeconomic fishery theory, applied in a general and partial equilibrium theory framework to determine if maximum sustainable yield (MSY) management targets have been achieved and maintained for four fisheries considered to be successfully managed and one characterized as a socio-economic disaster. The abundance of a fish stock is more influence by extra-market and extra-fishery forces than by fisheries managers who base allocation decisions solely on single species stock assessments.     

ASEAN-Canada Fisheries Post-Harvest Technology Project -- Phase II Project Implementation

The ASEAN-Canada Fisheries Post-Harvest Technology Project was initiated by Canada and ASEAN in support of regional efforts by ASEAN to increase their fish productivity for export and domestic consumption through improvements to fisheries post-harvest technologies. The objectives of Phase II of the Project were to strengthen and upgrade fisheries product quality control and inspection services and development of improved technologies in fish processing and preservation. The Project also enhanced the transfer of appropriate technologies to the fish processing industries, leading to strengthened government and industry capabilities in the ASEAN countries. The Project incorporated a unique implementation model in appointing an ASEAN Executing Agency, involving a local regional institution to implement and monitor the Project. The AEA concept was considered a successful model, warranting consideration for other similar projects.     

Commercial scale invertebrate fisheries enhancement in Australia: Experiences,challenges and opportunities

Stock enhancement or “assisted recruitment” for fisheries management in Australia is at an experimental R&D phase. Development of the science has focused largely on finfish targeted by the recreational sector; however it is considered that high value invertebrates will be the best candidates for commercial scale fisheries enhancement. Three main ingredients are required; technical capacity, governance capability, and the ‘correct’ species. The technical capacity needed is in the area of hatchery production and wild release methodologies, whilst the governance capability needed is informed policy that accounts for the complexities and interdisciplinary nature of stock enhancement. In particular, the appropriate articulation of policy to support economic development and integration into wild fisheries is currently lacking. If successful stock enhancement is implemented, the nature of fisheries management changes because the recruitment side of the fisheries equation is under substantial control, rather than just the production side. Management responses will require significant innovation, with a renewed emphasis on understanding the stock, rather than policing the fishers. By way of illustration, recent initiatives and key challenges encountered in Australian invertebrate fisheries are investigated through case studies. An example of a commercially-viable enhancement fishery that reflects solutions to the key challenges is also presented. The review ends with an argument to re-establish the context of stock enhancement in the discipline of ecological enhancement. This is a crucial and positive step forward for it recognises that, in principle, any renewable aquatic ecosystem has the potential to be enhanced instead of just depleted.     

Current and future trends in fisheries stock assessment and management

There are currently three dominant approaches to fisheries stock assessment: analysis of catch-at-age data; simple models of biomass dynamics (often called surplus production models) that rely only on catch and some index of abundance; and analysis of length frequency data. A key characteristic of all these methods is that they rely primarily on one type of data and ignore most of what is known about the biology of the species in question and what has been learned from fisheries elsewhere. Other information is sometimes included subjectively after the stock assessment is complete. The first major trend in assessment methods is developing ways of incorporating all that is known about the biology of a species into a single unified assessment procedure. The second major development is in methods of incorporating uncertainty in stock assessment, using statistical decision theory. At present few agencies have formal methods for treating the uncertainty inherent in stock assessment, and therefore uncertainty is often ignored. A number of trends in fisheries management are reviewed, including adoption of formal harvest strategies, recognition that fisheries management is a matter of decision-making and risk-taking, and the use of Monte-Carlo evaluation of fisheries management options. Future trends in stock assessment and management will likely include more attention to the behaviour of fishermen in response to regulations, more involvement of user-groups in decision-making, much more allocation of property rights, including complete privatization of some fisheries, and demand for evaluation of cost effectiveness of research and management activities. Threats to commercial fisheries as now known are discussed, including growing allocation to recreational and aboriginal users, environmentalists and the impact of aquaculture.     

基于DEA-Malmquist-Tobit模型的中国海洋渔业补贴财政效率及影响因素研究

作为世界上最大的渔业生产国和贸易国,中国渔业补贴政策的制定和实施对国计民生具有重大意义,也是推进海洋强国战略建设的题中应有之义。本文选取基于规模报酬可变假设的DEA模型测算了中国海洋渔业补贴的效率水平,进一步利用Malmquist指数对补贴效率的动态变化进行分解,探究效率变化的内在驱动因素,然后建立分析补贴效率影响因素的面板Tobit模型,对补贴投入和环境变量对补贴效率的影响进行分析,结果表明,当前我国海洋渔业补贴效率整体较低,且全要素生产率呈下降趋势,最后基于实证结果从改善补贴规模和调整产业结构等方面提出改善渔业补贴效率的对策建议。     

Variability and connectivity of plaice populations from the Eastern North Sea to the Western Baltic Sea,and implications for assessment and management

An essential prerequisite of sustainable fisheries is the match between biologically relevant processes and management action. Various populations may however co-occur on fishing grounds, although they might not belong to the same stock, leading to poor performance of stock assessment and management. Plaice in Kattegat and Skagerrak have traditionally been considered as one stock unit. Current understanding indicates that several plaice components may exist in the transition area between the North Sea and the Baltic Sea. A comprehensive review of all available biological knowledge on plaice in this area is performed, including published and unpublished literature together with the analyses of commercial and survey data and historical tagging data. The results suggest that plaice in Skagerrak is closely associated with plaice in the North Sea, although local populations are present in the area. Plaice in Kattegat, the Belts Sea and the Sound can be considered a stock unit, as is plaice in the Baltic Sea. The analyses revealed great heterogeneity in the dynamics and productivity of the various local components, and suggested for specific action to maintain biodiversity.     

The tragedy of soft choices: capacity accumulation and lopsided allocation in the Norwegian coastal cod fishery

Following years of reduced cod stocks and the build up of capture capacity in the coastal fleet, the Norwegian government implemented “access closure” and “vessel quotas” at the end of the 1980s, in order to bring capture capacity under control. However, despite these rather powerful policy tools, the capacity of the Norwegian cod fishery continued to increase during the 1990s. This paper outlines the processes that led to this increase in capture capacity and to the accumulation of vessels in the large size segments of the coastal fleet, the exact opposite result of that intended by the introduction of the fisheries policy. We present two main factors to explain these trends: Firstly, the expansion in quota factors due to exchange or renewal of vessels. This provides vessel-owners with more “vessel-meters” which are equivalent to an increased share of total quota under the maximal quota regulations. This situation implies a redistribution of resources from smaller to larger vessels. Secondly, improved efficiency of technology aboard the vessels makes the vessels more efficient as capture machines. The effect of these changes remains hidden as long as the total stock increases, which was the situation from the introduction of the new regime and until the late 1990s. When the stock once again declined, the effect of the capacity build-up was exposed. A decade of soft choices, adjustments, and adaptations has used up the available solutions. New regulations and a new policy are now required.     

Productivity change and fleet restructuring after transition to individual transferable quota management

Productivity change after transition to an individual transferable quota (ITQ) management system is driven by exit of some vessels, entry of other vessels, and changes in productivity of existing vessels. Generally, it is thought that an ITQ system boosts productivity due to the exit of less productive vessels. However, ITQ management systems also create an additional barrier to entry, and more productive vessels may not be able to enter the fishery. This study constructs the Färe–Primont index to measure productivity change for the Mid-Atlantic surf clam and ocean quahog fishery over a 32 year time period, which includes both pre and post-ITQ time periods. The index is then combined with a biomass change index to arrive at a measure of biomass adjusted productivity change. Results show that when biomass changes are considered, positive productivity gains occurred throughout the time period. Further examination of contributions from entering and survivor vessels show that entering vessels had little impact on aggregate productivity, but on an individual basis, they eventually were equal in productivity to survivor vessels.     

Decomposing productivity and efficiency changes in the Alaska head and gut factory trawl fleet

Fishing fleets are subject to numerous factors that affect economic performance, making identification and attribution of such impacts difficult. This paper separately identifies the effects of changing input and output prices, fishery management, and quota allocations on total factor productivity using a Lowe Index. Indices account for technical change and decompose productivity estimates into its technical, environmental, and scale-mix components. This results in measures that reflect shifts in the production frontier, and movements by vessels toward and around the frontier, to capture economies of scale and mix after a policy shift to a catch share program that includes fishing cooperatives and a limited access fishery. The difference between cooperative and limited access vessels is exploited to compare the changes in economic performance between the groups after the introduction of the shift to catch shares and cooperative management, which allowed the vessels to improve the timing and coordination across multi-species fisheries and to decrease incidental catch of quota-limited bycatch species that had closed the target fisheries prematurely in the past. Results indicate that total factor productivity increased significantly after the move to a catch share program, largely due to increases in technical change that shifted out the production frontier of the fishery.     

Subsidies,public goods,and external benefits in fisheries

The fisheries subsidy discussion has largely overlooked the increased welfare for society from Pigouvian subsidies that increase the supply of and investment in public goods when there are external benefits and free riding. Important fisheries public goods and external benefits include knowledge associated with new technology for “target” species and “bycatch” reduction, research and development for new technology, and ecosystem services and biodiversity. Careful definition of subsidies also requires consideration of the counter-factual or what would have happened without the action to which the fishery “subsidy” is attributed. Subsidies in the Western and Central Pacific tuna fishery are evaluated according to these and other criteria.     

Does threat of mutually assured destruction produce quasi-cooperation in the mackerel fishery?

This paper uses a quarterly, game-theoretic model of the Northeast Atlantic mackerel to study the fishing strategies of five players: the EU, Norway, the Faeroe Islands, Iceland, and the international fishery on the high seas. Data on the spatial distribution of fish catches (1977–2011) are used to model changes in the distribution of the mackerel stock. The Nash equilibrium solutions predict a severe decimation of the stock through overfishing, either by parties (Iceland, the Faeroe Islands) that refuse to cooperate or by a general absence of cooperation. There is a wide discrepancy between this prediction and reality, as the stock seems, at most, only moderately overexploited, despite non-cooperation by Iceland and the Faeroe Islands. It is conjectured that these parties, and others, may engage in a degree of quasi-cooperation that falls somewhat short of full cooperation but avoids the extreme destruction of the Nash equilibrium. This tacit cooperation can be seen as being maintained by a mutually assured destruction of the fisheries of all parties in case they go to the logical extremes of non-cooperation.     

National comprehensive approaches for rebuilding fisheries in South Korea

Korea's coastal and offshore fisheries have experienced reduction in their catch in the early 2000. The amount of catch from coastal and offshore fisheries dropped from 1.7 million tons in 1986 to 1 million tons in 2004. To address such catch reduction, fish stock enhancement programs have been constantly developed and implemented. However, as fish stocks have been estimated to decrease since 2000 in spite of various management measures, the Korean Government genuinely acknowledges the necessity to enhance fisheries productivity through the recovery of depleted fish stocks. Based on such acknowledgement, a fish stock rebuilding plan (FSRP) combined with conventional fish stock enhancement programs was established in 2005. For stocks which have shown drastic decrease, a FSRP was set up and promoted. So far, 10 FSRPs have been established and operated, and plan is being made to expand them to 20 species by 2012. The result of pilot projects shows that stocks have been increasing after the introduction of FSRPs. For instance, the catch per unit effort (CPUE) of sandfish in the East Sea has increased from 0.44 in 2005 to 0.78 in 2011. Consequently, fishing income has increased by 15%. The key lessons learned during the implementation of FSRP are: the causes for the decrease of stock vary and are complicated and it is necessary to adjust and eliminate some conventional policies that could have unforeseen negative impacts on fish stocks. The FSRP-based fisheries management policy in Korea carries great significance, for it has changed the focus of policy from simply maintaining the status quo to stock recovery and it allows relevant stakeholders to get actively involved in the procedures of establishing and promoting the plan, leading to effective implementation of the plan. The current FSRP is operated with species, but if it can be gradually expanded to encompass the whole ecosystem, it will greatly contribute to more effective management and fish stock recovery for all species in offshore and coastal waters surrounding Korea.     

Fisheries regulation: A survey of the literature on uncertainty,compliance behavior and asymmetric information

Economists normally claim that a stock externality arises within fisheries because each individual fisherman does not take the effect on stock size into account when making harvest decisions. Due to the stock externality, it is commonly argued that fisheries regulation is necessary, but regulatory decisions are complicated by a tremendous amount of uncertainty and asymmetric information. This paper provides an overview of selected parts of the literature on the regulation of fisheries under uncertainty and asymmetric information, and possible areas for future research are identified. Specifically, three main topics are covered. First, the issue of choosing regulatory instruments under uncertainty is discussed. Second, compliance and enforcement problems caused by fisheries regulation are investigated. Third, alternatives to a traditional enforcement policy are presented.     

Biological and economic vulnerabilities of fixed TACs in small pelagics: An analysis of the European anchovy (Engraulis encrasicolus) in the Gulf ofCádiz

A coupled population dynamics and economic model is applied to the purse seine anchovy-fishery in the Gulf of Cádiz. The model simulates the population dynamics, landings and profits on a probabilistic frame. These simulations are used to assess the biological and economic consequences of an individual quota management framework enveloped by a fixed Total Allowable Catch (TAC), the present strategy used to manage this stock in the Spanish fishery. Our results accurately indicate that this strategy magnifies the biological and economic vulnerabilities associated with the exploitation of the stock, thus jeopardizing the sustainability of this fishery. Alternative strategies, such as an adaptive TAC, are explored. The results indicate that even a basic implementation of an adaptive TAC seems more favorable than the present strategy in the necessary equilibrium between profits and sustainability. This paper provides tools and an assessment that may also be useful for other small pelagic fisheries.     

Assessing the significance of the economic impact of Marine Conservation Zones in the Irish Sea upon the fisheries sector and regional economy in Northern Ireland

This paper highlights the tension between advocacy for ‘Blue growth’ in maritime policy and efforts to safeguard future economic growth via the Marine Strategy Framework Directive. In 2015, policy-makers withdrew three of four proposed Marine Conservation Zones (MCZs) in the Irish Sea from consideration for designation, due to concerns that they could significantly impact on the fisheries sector in Northern Ireland because they overlap with prawn fishing grounds in the Irish Sea. Although research has quantified the potential impact upon fishing vessels, none has quantified the impact upon the fisheries sector nor assessed the significance of this impact. Arguably, MCZ designations (or lack thereof) based on the ‘significance’ of an impact require robust underpinning evidence. This paper reports the findings of an Economic Impact Assessment, which has quantified the impact of a decline in landings upon the Northern Ireland fisheries sector and regional economy (data which is currently absent from the evidence base for the MCZ designation process in England). It finds that this will incur job losses in three fishing ports in Northern Ireland, but is unlikely to have a significant impact upon Northern Ireland's fisheries sector and regional economy in terms of jobs and Gross Value Added (GVA). In the worst case, the resulting economic impact is a decrease of £1.05–1.12 m/year GVA in Northern Ireland, which is 1.1% of the contribution of fishing and fish processing to the regional economy. Economic significance assessments, using this methodology, may be useful in supporting the evidence base underpinning MCZ designation and other aspects of marine planning.     

Development in fleet fishing capacity in rights based fisheries

Individual Transferable Quota (ITQ) fisheries management systems are supposed to remedy the over-capacity problem associated with traditional command-and-control management systems. This paper provides some insight with respect to the impact of ITQs on vessel numbers in six different countries. The results indicate that the number of vessels was reduced by at least 30% within a few years of the implementation of individual vessel quotas. Thereafter a slow reduction in vessel numbers continued, indicating that it may take time period before over-capacity is fully removed. Moreover, the total effect on vessel numbers is surprisingly similar across countries and fisheries despite different degrees of transferability in the different cases analysed.     

A bio-economic analysis of harvest control rules for the Northeast Arctic cod fishery

Harvest control rules (HCRs) have been implemented for many fisheries worldwide. However, in most instances, those HCRs are not based on the explicit feedbacks between stock properties and economic considerations. This paper develops a bio-economic model that evaluates the HCR adopted in 2004 by the Joint Norwegian–Russian Fishery Commission to manage the world's largest cod stock, Northeast Arctic cod (NEA). The model considered here is biologically and economically detailed, and is the first to compare the performance of the stock's current HCR with that of alternative HCRs derived with optimality criteria. In particular, HCRs are optimized for economic objectives including fleet profits, economic welfare, and total yield and the emerging properties are analyzed. The performance of these optimal HCRs was compared with the currently used HCR. This paper show that the current HCR does in fact comes very close to maximizing profits. Furthermore, the results reveal that the HCR that maximizes profits is the most precautionary one among the considered HCRs. Finally, the HCR that maximizes yield leads to un-precautionary low levels of biomass. In these ways, the implementation of the HCR for NEA cod can be viewed as a success story that may provide valuable lessons for other fisheries.