Individual Transferable Quotas (individual + transferable_quota)

Distribution by Scientific Domains


Selected Abstracts


THE EFFECTS OF ITQ IMPLEMENTATION: A DYNAMIC APPROACH

NATURAL RESOURCE MODELING, Issue 4 2000
LEE G. ANDERSON
ABSTRACT. This paper investigates the intertemporal effects of introducing Individual Transferable Quota, ITQ, fishery management programs on stock size, fleet size and composition, and returns to quota holders and to vessel operators. Theoretical analysis is conducted using a specific version of a general dynamic model of a regulated fishery. It is demonstrated that the effects will differ depending upon the prevailing regulation program, current stock size, and existing fleet size, composition and mobility and upon how the stock and fleet change over time after the switch to ITQs. The paper expands upon previous works by modeling the dynamics of change in fleet and stock size and by allowing for changes in the TAC as stock size changes, by comparing ITQs to different regulations, and by allowing the status quo before ITQ implementation to be something other than a bioeconomic equilibrium. Specific cases are analyzed using a simulation model. The analysis shows that the annual return per unit harvest to quota owners can increase or decrease over the transition period due to counteracting effects of changes in stock and fleet size. With ITQs denominated as a percentage of the TAC, the current annual value of a quota share depends upon the annual return per unit of harvest and the annual amount of harvest rights. Because the per unit value can increase or decrease over time, it is also possible that the total value can do the same. Distribution effects are also studied and it is shown that while the gains from quota share received are the present value of a potentially infinite stream of returns, potential losses are the present value of a finite stream, the length of which depends upon the remaining life of the vessel and the expected time it will continue to operate. [source]


Profit and Price Effects of Multi-species Individual Transferable Quotas

JOURNAL OF AGRICULTURAL ECONOMICS, Issue 1 2005
Diane P. Dupont
Regulators in many countries have adopted individual transferable quotas as a means of dealing with the open access problem inherent in fisheries. Using individual vessel data prior to and after the introduction of ITQs in Canada's multi-species Scotia-Fundy mobile gear fishery, the paper uses an index number profit decomposition to compare vessel performance over time and across individual vessels. The approach allows us to undertake both an ex post evaluation of short-term impacts of ITQs and an ex ante evaluation of longer term impacts. With respect to short-term impacts, the results suggest that larger vessels have benefited the most from the introduction of ITQs, but that all vessels have enjoyed increases in the prices received for those fish species that are included in the quota program. With respect to longer-term impacts, the transferability provisions of the ITQ program have encouraged exit and more efficient operations to prevail. [source]


Closing the open sea: Development of fishery management in four Icelandic fisheries

NATURAL RESOURCES FORUM, Issue 1 2003
Thórólfur Matthíasson
The article outlines the development of Iceland's fishery rights and the extension of its territorial waters between the 1950s and the mid-1970s, whereby Iceland gained exclusive control and use of the marine resources of the waters within 12, later 50, and ultimately 200 nautical miles around the island. The article concentrates on four of Iceland's main fisheries: shrimp, herring, capelin and cod. These four fisheries are discussed separately and in depth, presenting the beginnings and growth of the industry and detailing the development of management practices and the corresponding legislation and regulatory measures. Iceland's initial concern was to gain control over the marine resources surrounding the island, but once this was achieved, the focus of attention shifted to managing first the economic and soon also the ecological aspects of its tremendous resource. Informed mainly by indigenous expertise, Iceland's concern was to limit overfishing, manage its fisheries sustainably both from the economic and ecological points of view, and find the best ways to distribute the revenues from the marine harvest. The article looks at each of the four fisheries to clarify how the individual transferable quota (ITQ) system came into being, how initial quota holdings were allotted, and analyses the circumstances under which the ITQ system became the management tool of choice. For each fishery, the process of regulatory evolution was quite unique. At the same time, there is a common pattern to all the fisheries, which may be summarized as follows. Firstly, serious attempts to reform management practices only got underway when the fishery had collapsed or was close to collapse. Secondly, stakeholders invariably started the process of regulation by limiting access to the fishery. Thirdly, a variety of rules were implemented to allocate rights to participate in the fishery to additional entrants once membership had been closed. Finally, prior to the invention of the ITQ system, prices were used to manage fisheries in Iceland. It may be concluded that the management of fisheries by ITQs may be a historical accident, rather than the end point of a logical evolution. [source]


How do individual transferable quotas affect marine ecosystems?

FISH AND FISHERIES, Issue 1 2009
Trevor A Branch
Abstract Published papers were reviewed to assess ecosystem impacts of individual transferable quotas (ITQs) and other dedicated access systems. Under ITQs, quota shares increase with higher abundance levels, thus fishers may request lower total allowable catches (TACs) and pay for monitoring and research that improves fishery sustainability. Mortality on target species generally declines because catches are closer to TACs and because ghost fishing through lost and abandoned gear decreases. High-grading and discarding often decline, but may increase if landings (and not catches) count against ITQs and when there is little at-sea enforcement. Overall, ITQs positively impact target species, although collapses can occur if TACs are set too high or if catches are routinely allowed to exceed TACs. Fishing pressure may increase on non-ITQ species because of spillover from ITQ fisheries, and in cases where fishers anticipate that future ITQ allocations will be based on catch history and therefore increase their current catches. Ecosystem and habitat impacts of ITQs were only sparsely covered in the literature and were difficult to assess: ITQs often lead to changes in total fishing effort (both positive and negative), spatial shifts in effort, and fishing gear modifications. Stock assessments may be complicated by changes in the relationship between catch per unit effort, and abundance, but ITQ participants will often assist in improving data collection and stock assessments. Overall, ITQs have largely positive effects on target species, but mixed or unknown effects on non-target fisheries and the overall ecosystem. Favourable outcomes were linked to sustainable TACs and effective enforcement. [source]


Are lobster fisheries being managed effectively?

FISHERIES MANAGEMENT & ECOLOGY, Issue 5 2010
Examples from New Zealand, Nova Scotia
Abstract, Based on performance, management of the New Zealand and Nova Scotia lobster fisheries can be considered successful, but management can be improved by clearer statements of objectives, more efficient mechanics of governance and quicker response to changes in stocks or fisheries. Principal tactics for lobster fishery management are individual transferable quotas and input controls in New Zealand and Nova Scotia respectively. Decision rules were considered important in both approaches and examples are provided of underperforming fisheries in the absence of decision rules. In Nova Scotia, strong fishers' organisations and fishery scientists were effective agents for change, whereas fisher advisory committees operating by consensus were not. In New Zealand, the quota management system provided strong incentives for fishers to become involved in responsible management, to take longer-term views of their resource and to take major management action on their own. [source]


Profit and Price Effects of Multi-species Individual Transferable Quotas

JOURNAL OF AGRICULTURAL ECONOMICS, Issue 1 2005
Diane P. Dupont
Regulators in many countries have adopted individual transferable quotas as a means of dealing with the open access problem inherent in fisheries. Using individual vessel data prior to and after the introduction of ITQs in Canada's multi-species Scotia-Fundy mobile gear fishery, the paper uses an index number profit decomposition to compare vessel performance over time and across individual vessels. The approach allows us to undertake both an ex post evaluation of short-term impacts of ITQs and an ex ante evaluation of longer term impacts. With respect to short-term impacts, the results suggest that larger vessels have benefited the most from the introduction of ITQs, but that all vessels have enjoyed increases in the prices received for those fish species that are included in the quota program. With respect to longer-term impacts, the transferability provisions of the ITQ program have encouraged exit and more efficient operations to prevail. [source]


The tragedy of the commons: property rights and markets as solutions to resource and environmental problems

AUSTRALIAN JOURNAL OF AGRICULTURAL & RESOURCE ECONOMICS, Issue 1 2009
Gary D. Libecap
In one way or another, all environmental and natural resource problems associated with overexploitation or under provision of public goods, arise from incompletely defined and enforced property rights. As a result private decision makers do not consider or internalize social benefits and costs in their production or investment actions. The gap between private and social net returns results in externalities , harmful effects on third parties: overfishing, excessive air pollution, unwarranted extraction or diversion of ground or surface water, extreme depletion of oil and gas reservoirs. These situations are all examples of the ,The Tragedy of the Commons'. In this paper, I consider options for mitigating the losses of open access: common or group property regimes, government tax and regulation policy, more formal private property rights. I briefly summarize the problems and advantages of each option and describe why there has been move toward rights-based instruments in recent years: ITQ (individual transferable quotas), tradable emission permits, and private water rights. Introductions to the papers in the special issue follow. [source]


Conflicting uses of marine resources: can ITQs promote an efficient solution?,

AUSTRALIAN JOURNAL OF AGRICULTURAL & RESOURCE ECONOMICS, Issue 1 2009
Ragnar Arnason
This paper examines the allocation problem arising from conflicting demands for marine resource use by (i) commercial fishers, (ii) recreational fishers, and (iii) conservationists. It is shown that decentralised trading of individual transferable quotas (ITQs) is capable of an efficient allocation of resource use between the first two parties. In contrast, it is found that the standard ITQ system is not capable of performing the same ideal co-ordination between the conflicting interests of extractive users, that is, all fishers, and the non-extractive ones, that is, conservationists. The reason is that quota trades between individual fishers and conservationists are inevitably accompanied by (positive) externalities on both other fishers and conservationists. As a result, decentralised quota trades between these parties cannot be efficient. The fundamental economic observation is that quotas for conservation and for extraction constitute two different goods. It follows that a socially optimal market allocation of these two goods requires two prices instead of the single quota price in the standard ITQ system. Thus, to achieve efficiency, the ITQ system has to be extended to incorporate both types of goods. It is shown in the paper that if fishers and conservationists can organise themselves into groups, trades of conservation quotas between the two groups can in principle lead to fully efficient allocation. An interesting implication of this modified ITQ system is that the need for a fisheries authority to set the total allowable catch (TACs) disappears. [source]