Reforming management of commercial fisheries in a small island territory

Michael Harte and John Barton

Marine Policy, 2007, vol. 31, issue 4, 371-378

Abstract: The Falkland Islands has successfully met many challenges in the management and development of its fisheries resources over the last 20 years. To meet a new set of challenges the current licensing system based on the allocation of non-transferable, variable duration licences to individual vessels is being replaced by a system of long-term individual transferable rights owned by Falkland Islanders. The anticipated gains are enhanced economic performance of the sector because fishing businesses have increased security and flexibility, rapid diversification from harvesting into value-added activities and increased international competitiveness as poorly performing companies sell rights to well performing companies. Implementing a rights-based regime in a small coastal state is challenging. Thin markets for rights, a desire to maintain local control of fishing rights, and a dependence on foreign direct investment in the fisheries sector are key considerations in the design of an effective and efficient management regime. Starting operation in 2006/07, the new rights-based management system provides a model for small coastal states or small industrial fisheries that previously had considered rights-based systems too complex to implement and administer, despite the inherent advantages of rights-based management.

Keywords: Falkland; Islands; Rights-based; management; Small; coastal; states; Input; controls (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2007
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0308-597X(06)00124-2
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:marpol:v:31:y:2007:i:4:p:371-378

Access Statistics for this article

Marine Policy is currently edited by Eddie Brown

More articles in Marine Policy from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().