User rights in the fisheries and salmon-farming of the Faroe Islands

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This paper focuses on the user rights regimes that have governed access to the marine resources of the Faroe Islands, which in the case of the fisheries are primarily fish stocks, and, in the case of salmon farming, primarily clean and healthy water masses. Examining the application of different user rights arrangements, we were able to observe a gradual improvement in the economic efficiency of the production activity for salmon farming, where strong operating exclusivity played a pivotal role in strengthening user rights. Similarly, the pelagic fisheries and the distant-waters demersal fisheries governed by ITQs have witnessed improved economic efficiency, although the strength of their user rights weakened over the last decade because of diminishing exclusivity and security of their rights. At the same time, the coastal demersal fisheries governed by ITEs continued to be marked by overcapacity and low fish stock levels despite the presence of strong exclusivity. These findings indicate that the design of user rights must also relate to specific management differences in marine resource exploitation under consideration.