1. Economic value of sustainable fisheries
Rupert Crilly
nef (the new economics foundation) and OCEAN2012

2. Overview Economic potential of fish stocks
Report: Jobs Lost at Sea
How fish are caught matters:
Report: Value Slipping through the Net
Concluding remarks
NB: All data presented are official or calculations based on official or academic data. Full explanations, lists of materials and methods, results and references can be found on the nef website.

3. We’ve all seen the graphs that look like this…
Time trends of community biomass in oceanic (a–i) and shelf (j–m) ecosystems. Relative biomass estimates from the beginning of industrialized fishing (solid points) are shown with superimposed fitted curves from individual maximum-likelihood fits (solid lines) and empirical Bayes predictions from a mixed-model fit (dashed lines).
Biomass of large predatory fish today is only about 10% of pre-industrial levels
Myers & Worm (2003), Nature

4. To the environment To people To the economy Costs of overfishing
Ecosystems at risk (instability, collapse, etc)
Irreversible loss (biodiversity)
To people
Food security
Livelihoods at risk
To the economy
Loss of wealth (lost rents, jobs)
Fishing industry at risk 4

5. Overfishing is a bad economic deal
FAO/World Bank estimate the annual cost of overfishing at US$50 billion, totalling US$2 trillion over the last three decades. UK catches for cod, whiting and haddock could be five, four and three times bigger if stocks were allowed to recover, with the potential to increase economic gains ten-fold to more than £500m. 5

6. Overfishing and the jobs that never were
Jobs Lost at Sea:
Overfishing and the jobs that never were
Our report studied the productive potential of fish stocks, and compared this to their current performance
Overfishing is defined relative to MSY
A stock can be sustainably fished but still be below MSY. This too is costly in production terms 6

7. Overfishing and the jobs that never were
Jobs Lost at Sea:
Overfishing and the jobs that never were
Our report studied the productive potential of fish stocks, and compared this to their current performance
Which fish stocks?
43 spread across the North East Atlantic, including multiple cod, haddock, herring and sole stocks (note: excludes all Mediterranean stocks)
There are more than 150 fish stocks in the EU 7

8. Difference between current and potential landings for all stocks
Estimating economic costs - 1
Difference between current and potential landings for all stocks
Landings in 2010 vs MSY
Results: 8

9. Value this difference Results: Estimating economic costs - 2
Using a price per tonne for each stock, on a regional basis
Results:

10. Jobs supported per country
Estimating economic costs - 3
Jobs supported per country
Fishing
Processing
Results:

11. Results for top 10 stocks

12. Results per country

13. Rebuild stocks or depend on taxpayer subsidies?

14. Managing scarce resources
Public ownership of the resource…
…means the public should gain from its exploitation
Fisheries management should seek to deliver positive net returns to society
But how are the greatest benefits to be delivered?
Broaden focus from economic performance to include social and environmental factors

15. How fish are caught matters
In an era of scarce natural resources, the question of who exploits the resource for public benefit is crucial because this determines the future of the stock
Access criteria offer a viable solution
Environmental criteria
Selective gear
Minimise bycatch
Minimise ecosystem impacts
Social criteria
Employment
Improve food security
Economic criteria
Loss of wealth (lost rents, jobs)
Subsidies
Fishing industry resilience
NB all relative because this will promote
perpetual competition 15

16. Case study of an overfished stock: North Sea Cod
ICES areas 27.IVa-c

17. Compare gear type to see which have the highest net societal values
Objectives
Compare gear type to see which have the highest net societal values
There are many factors to consider, but we look at a sample:
Economic: revenues, costs & subsidies
Environmental: discards & GHG emissions
Social: employment
But there are many others:
Communities
Historic and cultural value
Stock sustainability (i.e. the impact of removing one tonne from the stock depends on the gear)

18. The main gears targeting cod in the North Sea are gillnets and trawls18

19. Gear selectivity Proportion of catch (by numbers) Landings Discards
In numbers, not tonnes

20. Results Specific to cod fishing, attributed proportionally
Presented on a per tonne basis
By categories: Gillnets 0-12m, Trawls 0-12m, 12-24m, 24-40m, >40m

21. Fuel & direct subsidies
Largest vessels receive most subsidies

22. Employment

23. Net impacts of gear types
Gillnets have the largest net benefit to society
The larger the trawler, the more costly
These results are not reflected in quota allocations

24. Policy
Quota’s should be set in accordance with scientific advice on how to reach BMSY (or BMMSY)
Public resources (incl subsidies) allocated to those who fish the most sustainably

25. Contact: Rupert Crilly
nef (new economics foundation) and OCEAN2012