Catch Share Systems: Requirements for Success

It is clear to students of fishery management that property rights systems are economically more efficient than open access systems.  The catch share system as a property right system has important potential.  However, the magnitude of the potential is constrained by the quality of its implementation and available management resources.  The talk describes several catch share systems in the context of strategic operational components necessary to facilitate optimal operation.  These components include industry and user involvement in focusing on 1) a cost-effective information system that uses sampling theoretic concepts based on fishing boats to collect and disseminate information in virtual real time to managers and industry, 2) the development of new fishing effort management algorithms that target sustained yield in the fisheries (rather than MSY of individual stocks), and 3) creating a national institute to develop new strategies for using ocean weather and climate to lend new understanding to the forecast of fish stock variability.