Multilevel governance and management of shared stocks with integrated markets: The European anchovy case

Abstract

Bioeconomics of shared stocks and integration between markets are two aspects often debated in the literature but rarely analyzed together. Although both aspects are essential for the economic optimization of the fisheries, the general impression is that the European governance, at every level, is at the moment more concerned with the biological interactions rather than the market interactions of landings. The objective of the study is therefore to focus these two elements using as case studies the two shared European anchovy fisheries of Croatia and Italy in the Adriatic Sea and France and Spain in the Bay of Biscay. The analysis is carried out by means of the Institutional Analysis and Development (IAD) framework for the description of the system, and through a graphical bioeconomic tool in order to explain causal interactions between rules, stocks, landings and prices, and possible equilibrium solutions. The analysis confirms that, with the exception of some differences in the governance structure, management authorities are more concerned with biological interactions in the Atlantic, while in the Mediterranean Sea cooperation is very poor. On the other hand trade, especially from Italy to Spain, is an important factor to balance disequilibrium between supply and demand and for the formation of price. The analysis also shows how coordinated planning of two shared stocks, in two European sea-basins, exploited by four countries, could achieve a more profitable exploitation, leading to higher stocks of anchovy and increased economic profit for the fisheries. However this kind of cooperation should have a bottom-up origin, with the Producer Organizations as key actors.