Document Type

Article

Department/Program

Virginia Institute of Marine Science

Publication Date

2018

Journal

Marine Resource Economics

Volume

33

Issue

4

Abstract

Observed production sets in multispecies fisheries are affected by regulatory incentives influencing spatiotemporal fishing decisions. Rights-based output controls can promote selective fishing; however, this ability may be limited and insufficient in achieving full utilization of catch quotas. We measure fishing selectivity for bottom trawlers catching federally regulated groundfish in the Gulf of Maine and Georges Bank before and after the introduction of rights-based output controls. Directional distance functions are applied to tow-level catch data collected by fishery observers to construct a measure of selectivity equal to the difference between strong and weak output disposal efficient production frontiers. Quantile regressions are then used to estimate the change inmedian selectivity associatedwith the introduction of catch sharemanagement, controlling for spatial, temporal, and individual factors.Asignificant improvement in selectivity was found for tows in Georges Bank following the 2010 management change, though production is still largely characterized by imperfect selectivity.

Keywords

Catch shares, directional distance function, fishing selectivity, multispecies fishery, production frontier, weak output disposability.

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