Individual Transferable Quotas (ITQ), Rebuilding Fisheries and Short-Termism: How Biased Reasoning Impacts Management

Edward J Garrity

doi:10.3390/systems8010007

Abstract

Recent research on global fisheries has reconfirmed a 2006 study that suggested global fisheries would collapse by 2048 if fisheries were not better managed and trends reversed. While many researchers have endorsed rights-based fishery management as a key ingredient for successful management and rebuilding fisheries, in practice the results are mixed and success varies by geographic region. Rights-based approaches such as individual transferable quota (ITQ) provide a necessary help to the important task of rebuilding fisheries, but we assert that they are sometimes less effective due to the human component of the system. Specifically, we examine the issue of setting an appropriate total allowable catch (TAC) in Individual Transferable Quota (ITQ) systems. ITQ are designed on the premise that economic ownership is sufficient incentive to entice fishers to be stewards of the resource. However, an excessive short-term orientation and an affective risk response by fishers can overwhelm feelings of ownership. In such cases, fishers and fishing communities can exert sufficient pressure on TAC setting and reduce the effectiveness of ITQ fisheries toward rebuilding fish stocks. Based on our analysis that draws on cognitive psychology, short-termism, and affective risk, we suggest heightened and wider democratic involvement by stakeholders in co-managed ITQ fisheries along with potential pilot tests of government-assisted financial transfers to help in transitioning ITQ fisheries to sustainable states.

Highlights

Oceans cover over 71% of the Earth’s surface and support approximately 3 billion people with food and nutrition
individual transferable quota (ITQ) are designed on the premise that economic ownership is sufficient incentive to entice fishers to be stewards of the resource
Based on our analysis that draws on cognitive psychology, short-termism, and affective risk, we suggest heightened and wider democratic involvement by stakeholders in co-managed ITQ fisheries along with potential pilot tests of government-assisted financial transfers to help in transitioning ITQ fisheries to sustainable states

Summary

Introduction

Oceans cover over 71% of the Earth’s surface and support approximately 3 billion people with food and nutrition. In the case of a fishery where stock rebuilding is necessary, we can trace the causal influences starting In this diagram, we use quota in a general sense, as information feedback that influences participant with a decreasing bio-economic “1. High levels of ownership (or community stewardship) mean that quota setting will be lower and allow for stock rebuilding or long-run sustainable management of the resource. Lease fishers (non-quota holders) have been empirically observed to prefer more restrictive TAC levels compared to the actual quota shareholders [42] This appears to be counterintuitive since a standard rationale for ITQ systems is that quota holders have economic and ecological incentives for well-managed stocks, as quota owners can benefit from long-run rebuilding efforts

Psychological Ownership as Distinct from Economic Ownership

Findings

Summary and Conclusions