How have catch shares been allocated?

A unique database was created that describes the methods used to allocate shares in nearly every major catch share fishery in the world. Approximately 54% of the major catch share fisheries in the world allocated the Total Allowable Catch (TAC) solely on the basis of historical catch records, 3% used auctions, and 6% used equal sharing rules. The remaining 37% used a combination of methods, including vessel-based rules. These results confirm the widely-held belief that nearly all catch share programs have “grandfathered” private access to fishery resources: 91% of the fisheries in the database allocated some fraction of the TAC on the basis of historical catch. This publicly available database should be a useful reference tool for policymakers, academics, and others interested in catch shares management in Hawai'i and across the globe.     

Direct marketing strategies: The rise of community supported fishery programs

Community Supported Fishery (CSF) Programs are arrangements between fishermen and consumers where consumers provide upfront payments to fishermen in exchange for scheduled seafood deliveries. They are modeled after the popular Community Supported Agriculture Programs, a form of direct-to-consumer-marketing in which a group of individuals support a farm. There are multiple market and non-market benefits from these programs. Fishermen receive higher prices for fish, are guaranteed a stable income, and can activate political and regulatory support through direct interaction with consumers. Consumers are provided with access to high-quality novel types of fish and benefit from interactions with the producers of their food. CSFs have frequently collaborated with non-governmental organizations to address the challenges associated with these programs. Under the catch share system in the Northeast US groundfish fishery, sectors may be well-positioned to implement a CSF. Direct marketing through a CSF is not likely to completely replace traditional markets for fishermen, but can be a valuable supplement to their operations.     

Economic characteristics and management challenges of the Hawaii pelagic longline fisheries: Will a catch share program help?

To date, none of the fisheries in the U.S. Pacific Islands Region is managed under a catch share program. In light of the NOAA policy to encourage the use of catch shares as a fishery management tool, the Western Pacific Fishery Management Council (WPFMC) listed six commercial fisheries, including the Hawaii pelagic longline fishery, the largest in the region, as potential candidates for catch share programs. This study examines the baseline economic characteristics and the main challenges facing the Hawaii pelagic longline fishery and evaluates the impact of these on the desirability and feasibility of a catch share program for this particular fishery.     

Catch shares and the main Hawaiian Islands bottomfish fishery: Linking fishery conditions and fisher perceptions

To address overfishing concerns, a total allowable catch (TAC) management program was instituted in the main Hawaiian Islands (MHI) bottomfish fishery during 2007. Using results from a recent survey of bottomfish fishermen, this paper details behavioral and social aspects of bottomfish fishing in Hawaii and explores fisher perceptions towards current fishery conditions and future management alternatives. The paper further discusses the applicability of potential catch share management for this fishery. Bottomfish fishermen expressed uncertainty towards catch share programs and appear to be reluctant about any movement towards catch share management. This paper describes many preexisting conditions in the fishery that suggest a catch share program may not be practical at this time.     

Catch share programs in developing countries: A survey of the literature

The literature on catch shares is dominated by analyses of programs in developed countries. To address this research gap, this paper identifies and discusses programs in developing countries. The paper also investigates differences between countries that have and have not implemented programs across a number of relevant dimensions, including governance and resource value, and characterizes the relationship between catch share type (e.g., quota-based or space-based systems) and the species characteristics. The paper identifies programs in about 20 percent of coastal and developing countries and finds that countries with catch shares have higher governance rankings, stronger economies, more valuable fishery export industries, and fewer people employed in fisheries. For example, the average governance effectiveness rank is 38.7 for all coastal and developing countries and 60.8 for countries with quota-based fishing rights. Species managed under quota-based systems are also found to have the potential for strong recruitment externalities. The results support ideas from the fisheries economics literature on the pre-conditions that are more likely to lead to the adoption of a catch share program.     

Free form property rights for fisheries: The decentralized design of rights-based management through groundfish “sectors” in New England

Harvest cooperatives were implemented in several US fisheries over the last decade during a period when US law prohibited implementation of any new individual fishery quota (IFQ) systems. Harvest cooperatives provided an alternative to individual quotas as a means to end the race for fish and increase fishery profitability. The prohibition on new IFQ systems in the US was lifted, but harvest cooperatives remain a more feasible and perhaps a superior alternative to IFQs for some fisheries. The New England Fishery Management Council is on the verge of implementing a new management system for the groundfish fishery based on harvest cooperatives known as “sectors”. This paper describes the New England sector management system and discusses a number of advantages but also some drawbacks relative to IFQs. It argues that a hybrid of the two approaches could have advantages over either.     

Sharing the catch or catching the shares: Catch shares for the western Pacific region?

The applicability of catch shares programs is evaluated for the various fisheries of the Western Pacific Fishery Management Council region in each of the archipelagoes. Implementation of Catch Shares programs in the region is problematic, but would require better data to be done fairly and equitably. Catch shares are currently under initial consideration for the Hawaii and American Samoa longline fisheries and the Hawaii Deep 7 bottomfish fishery. It is argued that current conditions in all the other small boat fisheries in the region make them inappropriate for catch shares management. Overfishing and the “race for fish” are not yet an issue for these fisheries and some are underdeveloped. Catch share programs can cause significant negative social consequences for Western Pacific communities because data on fishermen's participation, catch histories, and motivations to fish for cultural needs is not adequate for any initial allocation scheme to be developed equitably. The prevailing Western Pacific cultural value of sharing the fish by gifting portions, sharing the catch widely and sharing fishing opportunities widely is in clear conflict with the individualized commercial profit motive philosophy of fisheries that are appropriate for catch shares. The small boat fisheries lack adequate monitoring and enforcement, and do not have a total allowable catch or quota. Nor do they usually have a demonstrated need for one. Preliminary community outreach by Council staff and community discussion of catch shares shows a general lack of information yet a potential for strong resistance to the imposition of catch shares.     

Unintended consequences: The spillover effects of common property regulations

The closure of the Hawaiian longline swordfish fishery over the period 2001–2004, which was motivated by the protection of endangered sea turtles, created the elements of a natural experiment that allows identification of the market transfer of catch (and sea turtle bycatch) to other regions. This paper exploits the fact that the vessels in the Hawaiian longline fishery sell their catch in the US fresh swordfish market to analyze the pattern of changes in US fresh and frozen swordfish consumption both before and after the closure regulation was imposed. The mechanisms by which any unintended consequences on endangered sea turtles in other fishery locations in the world are shown to take place through the US swordfish market. At the estimated annual market transfer, a bootstrap analysis of the probability distribution of bycatch rates indicates that the regulation led to an additional 2882 sea turtle interactions at the sample means.     

Quota concentration in the New Zealand fishery: Annual catch entitlement and the small fisher

New Zealand's quota management system (QMS) was introduced in 1986 to enhance the sustainability of New Zealand's fishery. This paper examines trends in quota and catch share concentration across a range of important fish stocks. It demonstrates that continuing concentration is occurring in the ownership of quota for deepwater species. At the same time there has been an increase in participation by small scale fishers in the inshore fishery. This appears to be driven by the introduction of the Annual Catch Entitlement (ACE) regime, allowing annual catch shares to be accessed at reduced transaction cost.     

Tradable permit programs: What are the lessons for the new Alaska halibut catch sharing plan?

To address long-standing allocation conflicts between the Pacific halibut commercial fishing sector and recreational charter (for-hire) sector in Alaska, an Alaska halibut catch sharing plan (CSP) is being implemented in 2014 that has a provision allowing the leasing of commercial individual fishing quota to recreational charter businesses. This one-way inter-sectoral trading allows for the charter sector to increase its share of the total allowable catch while compensating commercial fishermen. This type of catch shares program is novel in fisheries. In this paper, the literature on non-fisheries tradable permit programs (TPPs) that have similarities to the Alaska halibut CSP program is examined. Several successful TPPs are discussed, including ones from emissions trading programs, water quality trading programs, water markets, and transferable development rights programs. They are then evaluated in terms of their similarities and differences to the Alaska CSP program. Characteristics not part of the current CSP that other TPPs have used and that may increase the likelihood for the CSP to be effective in achieving its primary goals (if they are implemented) are identified, such as allowing more flexible transfers (e.g., internal transfers), intertemporal banking, cooperative structures, and multi-year leasing.     

Catch share programs in the Western Pacific—A solution in search of a problem?

The movement toward catch shares by NOAA Fisheries and fisheries managers worldwide responds to dysfunctional fisheries plagued by a host of interrelated problems including radically shortened seasons, a race to fish, supply gluts, lowered product quality, increased bycatch, safety issues, excess capacity, and lack of profitability. However, the NOAA Catch Shares Policy recognizes that catch shares are not appropriate for every fishery, and others have agreed that the success of catch shares programs depends on their fit with ecological, economic, and social characteristics. This article describes the characteristics of the Hawaii-based deep-set longline fleet, identified by NOAA Fisheries as a possible candidate for catch shares because it operates under a bigeye tuna quota instituted by the Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission. One of the main concerns in the fishery is the potential for closing during the holiday season, a culturally important time for fish consumption in Hawaii. An evaluation of the fishery suggests that many of the problems leading to development of catch shares programs in other fisheries are not present, but that some warning signs exist which could be addressed by catch share programs or other management alternatives.     

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.     

Cooperatives,concessions, and co-management on the Pacific coast of Mexico

Ten fishery cooperatives of the Pacific coast of Mexico were studied to examine reasons for successful community-based management of the fishery commons. The cooperatives hold exclusive rights to ‘concession’ territories for major fisheries and are linked by geographic adjacency and through a federation. The case study underscores the role of factors such as smallness of scale; the productivity, visibility and legibility of the resources and fisheries involved; clarity of social and territorial boundaries; adjacency and linkages among territorial units; a strong sense of community. The cooperatives also made considerable investments in attaining high levels of knowledge, leadership, transparent and democratic decision-making, and “vigilance,” or enforcement of the rules and the running of the organization. The study also shows the workings of windows of opportunity and experience with environmental change in the development of strong and adaptive capacities for co-management between local organizations and government agencies. Although particular histories and larger legal, political, and cultural contexts matter, the Mexican case supports arguments for greater community-level engagement in “catch share” and territorial management throughout the Pacific.     

Local permit ownership in Alaska salmon fisheries

Changes in ownership of limited entry permits by “local” residents of the region where a fishery occurs may have significant economic and social implications for fishery-dependent regions. This paper examines changes in local permit ownership in Alaska salmon fisheries, for which a long-term decline in rural local permit ownership is an important policy concern. Theoretically, permit markets allocate permits over time to the individuals who are willing to pay the most for them. Any factors that differentially affect what local and non-local residents are willing to pay for permits may affect the equilibrium share of permits held by local residents. For remote rural fisheries in particular, these may include differences between local and non-local residents with respect to access to and costs of financing permits and boats, costs of travel to the fishery, opportunity costs of participation in the fishery, and many other factors. As a fishery increases in profitability, differences between local and non-local residents in access to financing matter more while differences in costs of travel and opportunity costs matter less in the relative ranking of what local and non-local residents are willing to pay for permits. This tends to increase the share of non-local residents among buyers willing to pay the market price for permits, reducing the equilibrium share of permits held by local residents. This leads to a conflict between two important policy goals: increasing fishery profitability and maintaining rural local permit ownership. Consistent with predictions of this theory, the local share of permit ownership in Alaska salmon fisheries is negatively related to permit prices (an indicator of fishery profitability).     

Fish catch data: Less than what meets the eye

A recent opinion piece published in Nature summarises the differing views held by Pauly on the one hand, and by Hilborn and Branch on the other, regarding the challenge faced by fishery scientists in accurately determining the status of the world's fisheries. Both commentaries discuss whether the fisheries catch data published by FAO can by themselves be used to infer fishery status. The purpose of this short communication is to examine both views and to propose additional solutions to contribute to the understanding of fishery status globally. These may include expanding data-poor stock assessment methods as well as community-based data collection and monitoring programs, particularly in developing countries.     

Can vessel buybacks pay off: An evaluation of an industry funded fishing vessel buyback

Fishing vessel and permit buyback programs have been implemented to reduce excess capacity and improve profitability in a number of fisheries around the world. These programs are generally publicly funded, but in a few cases they have been financed by loans to be paid back by the remaining fleet. In 2003, a buyback permanently removed 91 vessels and 239 fishing permits from the Pacific groundfish trawl fishery and associated corollary fisheries of Dungeness crab and pink shrimp. The buyback was financed with $10 million in public funding and a $36 million loan to be repaid over 30 years with fees on landings. In the same year, a control date was set for catch share program in the groundfish trawl fishery. When the catch share program was implemented in 2011, the permit owners that remained in the fishery after the buyback were allocated the quota shares that would otherwise have been issued to the permits bought back in 2003. Estimates of the annual profits generated by this quota are compared to the cost of servicing the buyback loan. The results provide evidence that a buyback program, when implemented in conjunction with catch shares, can enable a sustained increase in profitability for the remaining vessels sufficient to justify its cost. However, using landings taxes as the mechanism to repay the loan may result in a mismatch between those who benefit from and pay for the buyback.     

Catch shares have not led to catch-quota balancing in two North American multispecies trawl fisheries

Catch shares, where annual catch limits are divided among individuals, communities or cooperatives, are a commonly used fisheries management strategy to increase profits and reduce overcapitalization. Usually these quota shares can be sold or leased, which is theorized to allow for greater utilization of fleet-wide quota. However, this catch-quota balancing may not be achieved in multispecies trawl fisheries where it is difficult to selectively target valuable species while avoiding overfished species. Two similar catch-share-managed, multispecies trawl fisheries were compared to evaluate whether catch shares lead to catch-quota balancing. The U.S. West Coast Groundfish fishery has several species with low total allowable catches (TACs) while the Canadian British Columbia Trawl fishery has comparatively higher TACs. Results indicate that the West Coast fishery had a statistically significant decrease in catch-quota ratios from 0.41 in the three years before catch shares to 0.29 in the three years after catch shares. In contrast, the BC fishery experience no statistically significant change in fishery-wide average catch-quota ratios, which were 0.70 in the three years before and 0.62 in the three years after catch shares. In the West Coast fishery, the risk of exceeding quotas for some species may be so high that fishers are unable to achieve high degrees of catch-quota balancing and instead focus on species that can be easily selected with changes in fishing behavior. Multispecies fisheries management has direct tradeoffs between maximizing yield and achieving conservation goals, and these results may highlight the tradeoff between rebuilding overfished species by reducing TACs, and the achievement of catch-quota balancing.     

Fleet communication to abate fisheries bycatch

Fleet communication systems report near real-time observations of bycatch hotspots to enable a fishery to operate as a coordinated “One Fleet” to substantially reduce fleet-wide capture of protected bycatch species. This benefits the bycatch species per se, reduces waste, and can provide economic benefits to industry by reducing risk of exceeding bycatch thresholds and causing future declines in target species catch levels. We describe case studies of fleet communication programs of the US North Atlantic longline swordfish fishery, US North Pacific and Alaska trawl fisheries, and US Alaska demersal longline fisheries, and identify alternative fleet communication program designs to reduce fisheries bycatch. Evidence supports the inference that these three fleet communication programs substantially reduced fisheries bycatch and provided economic benefits that greatly outweighed operational costs. Fleet communication may be appropriate in fisheries where there are strong economic incentives to reduce bycatch, interactions with bycatch species are rare events, adequate onboard observer coverage exists, and for large fleets, vessels are represented by a fishery association.     

Vertical integration in the post-IFQ halibut fishery

In some fisheries, claims have been made that quota programs have led to increased vertical integration, with processors controlling quota and fishermen. In the US halibut fishery a quota program was designed specifically to maintain the small-scale vessel nature of the fishery. This paper reports on what changes have been seen in the vertical structure of the halibut fishery and offers some explanation for these changes. Results indicate that the specific rights granted can have significantly different effects on the vertical structure of the industry. In the case of the halibut fishery vertical integration was avoided and market transactions actually increased.     

Sourcing seafood for the three major markets: The EU,Japan and the USA

This paper describes the marine fish and invertebrate consumption in three of the world’s major seafood markets (the EU, Japan and the USA) using a series of global maps indicating the likely origin of the seafood consumed by each market. These maps display a high level of dependence by these markets on foreign sources as the serial depletion of local fisheries resources forced the fleets in search for new seafood supplies well beyond their domestic waters. The acquisition of foreign (and high seas) seafood by these markets is conducted through two channels: by dispatching distant water fishing fleets that directly exploit foreign stocks; and by importing catch landed elsewhere by local fleets. The results also demonstrate that each of the three major markets occupies a zone of influence within which it is dominant.