Preliminary Findings From the Bering Sea/Aleutian Islands Crab Rationalization Program

In the fall of 2005, the NOAA Fisheries implemented a share-based management program in the Bering Sea and Aleutian Island crab fisheries. Allocations of harvest and processing quota were issued to vessel and plant owners based on historical landings, with a share matching requirement applied to 90% of harvest quota. The remaining 10% of vessel owners' harvest quota is exempt from the share matching requirement and can be landed for sale to any licensed buyer. The processor quota component of this system is intended as a community protection measure and to prevent stranded capital in remote Bering Sea processing facilities, while the initial 90/10 split was intended to maintain competitive ex-vessel prices. As part of the rationalization program, a detailed cost and earnings data collection was implemented contemporaneously, in part, to provide for a more thorough the understanding of the impacts of the change in management. Economic data are collected from all sectors (catcher vessels, catcher processors, shore-based processors, and floating processors) concerning most aspects of their crab fisheries operations. This paper presents findings from the first two years of the rationalized fishery, with a focus on the distribution of rents between processing plant and vessel operators, quota owners, and harvest crews, and the efficacy of the 90/10 share split.Keywords: Share-based management program, Fisheries Economics, Harvest quota, Crab fisheries, Aleutian Islands, Bering Sea, Rationalization progra

A choice experiment analysis of public preferences for conservation of biological diversity in the Oregon Coast Range

Ecosystem management has become an increasingly mainstream paradigm for natural resource management. Nowhere is this more evident than on the public and private forestland of the Pacific Northwest. While ecosystem management has become a widely accepted principle of resource management, substantial questions remain about its implementation. A case in point is the conservation of biological diversity: within both the scientific literature and the policy debate, it is unclear what are the best methods for its conservation. In addition, the public goods nature of biological diversity limits the ability of managers and policy makers to use economic information to prioritize biodiversity policy goals in making resource management decisions. This study uses a choice experiment (CE) framework to produce utility theoretic estimates of the welfare effects of changes in the level of biodiversity protection under different conservation programs. The sample frame for the study spans Oregon households, with three regional strata (Eastern, Willamette Valley, and Coastal), allowing measurement of regional preference heterogeneity. We present biodiversity policy as an amalgam of four different conservation programs: aquatic habitat conservation, forest rotation management, endangered species protection, and large-scale conservation reserves. The study results indicate substantial support for conservation programs. While WTP is positive for initial increases above baseline levels of protection, results indicate that WTP for large increases fall to zero or become negative, requiring monetary compensation for further increases, substantial increases over the current baseline would generate increased consumer surplus, though overall location of land resources to biodiversity is perceived on average as a welfare loss. The survey instrument included a dichotomous choice contingent valuation WTP elicitation for the purpose of methodological comparison to the CE approach. Results tentatively support the conclusion that the CE approach produces more conservative (lower) estimates of consumer surplus. The study also indicated a strong bias toward the management status quo, though the basis for this preference, and its importance in the context of policy analysis, remains an important subject for further research

Public Preferences for Forest Ecosystem Management in Japan with Emphasis on Species Diversity

We carried out online choice experiments (CE) to investigate what value Japanese individuals assign to rare versus familiar species in forest ecosystem, and to determine how preference heterogeneity arises. CE attributes comprised a forestry charge as the price attribute and rare versus familiar species of animals or plants as the good to be valued. Species numbers in a 5 km-mesh forest area were evaluated without the use of species names to focus purely on responses to numerical changes. Positional effects were also tested to validate results regarding alternatives and attributes other than the price attribute. A random parameter logit model was adopted to capture preferences for species diversity. After confirming that no positional effects existed, we found that (1) rare animals were valued more highly than rare plants, (2) familiar plants were assigned a positive value, but familiar animals were not assigned significant value at the mean parameter estimate, and (3) preference heterogeneities existed for all species. The sources of preference heterogeneity were analyzed with a latent class model having principal components of environmental attitudes. The influence of such attitudes was shown to be significant and suggested that attention should be paid to belief systems rather than solely demographics

Socioeconomic Data for Fisheries off Alaska: Current Status and Needs

Management actions considered by regional fishery management councils can generate significant impacts on the magnitude and distribution of the economic and sociocultural well-being of stakeholders. It is therefore important that policy analysts be able to account for the relevant parties whose economic well-being is affected by fisheries and derive estimates of the elements that comprise each partys net economic benefits derived from utilization of resources. We survey the primary state and federal socioeconomic data that are systematically collected for analyzing fishery management actions in and off Alaska and note the critical areas in which data collection should be enhanced to improve socioeconomic analyses. By designing data collections to better encompass the appropriate group of stakeholders for whom impacts should be considered and to capture the relevant costs and revenues in fisheries, analysts can provide fishery managers with a significantly heightened ability to evaluate the trade-offs associated with different policies and management actions. Many of the lessons learned in analyzing data capabilities and needs in this region can be of use to analysts elsewhere, whether they are trying to best utilize existing data or implement new data collection programs

Selecting Biological Reserves Cost-Effectively: An Application to Terrestrial Vertebrate Conservation in Oregon

Concerns that the loss of habitat have greatly increased species extinction rates has led to calls for establishing biological reserves to preserve key habitat. In this paper, we study reserve site selection for terrestrial vertebrates in Oregon using data on species ranges and land values. We find cost-effective strategies that represent a maximum number of species for a given conservation budget. By varying the budget, we find the cost of obtaining various levels of representation. In general, effective conservation decision-making requires integrated analysis of both biological and economic data.

Employment and Remuneration Effects of IFQs in the Bering Sea/Aleutian Islands Crab Fisheries

This article utilizes a census of vessels before and after implementation of catch shares in the Bering Sea/Aleutian Island (BSAI) crab fisheries to examine the short-run effects of catch shares on employment and remuneration of crew. The number of individuals employed declined proportionately to the exit of vessels following implementation. Total crew hours dedicated to fishing activities remained roughly constant, while employment in redundant pre- and post-season activities declined due to the consolidation of quota on fewer vessels. We find little evidence of substantial changes in the share contracts used to compensate fishermen. Finally, we explore a wide array of remuneration measures for crew and conclude that both seasonal and daily employment remuneration increased substantially for many crew in the post-rationalization fishery, while remuneration per unit of landings declined as a result of a combination of increased crew productivity and the necessity of paying for fishing quota in the new system.IFQ, rationalization, crab, Alaska, crew, remuneration, Research and Development/Tech Change/Emerging Technologies, Research Methods/ Statistical Methods, J24, J33, Q22, Q28,