Very early in the life of my blog, I knew that I wanted to talk about overfishing, and how to properly use the government to eliminate it. Time passed, and Steven Den Beste of USS Clueless wrote an article about something called "The Tragedy of the Commons." I thought, yep, that's the concept I was talking about-- except that I hadn't 'talked' about it at all. But when Lynne Kiesling of Knowledge Problem posted on the exact subject of reducing overfishing (hat tip: Insults Unpunished), I was finally spurred to action.
Allow me to explain the situation. The ocean is a big place, with a lot of fish, and it will support a certain amount of fishing without a perennial decrease in the fish population. As the harvest increases, a point will be reached where the population declines, because fish are being caught faster than they can reproduce (faster than they can reproduce in the wild, that is). Thus there is a smaller base population for future growth, and if 'nothing is done,' the decline will become increasingly precipitous.
Assuming that these fish are located in waters where anyone can catch them, the situation will play out like this: With fewer fish to catch, the harvest will become smaller-- putting economic pressure on fisherman to catch as many fish as possible, which only hastens the decline. There are only two options: keep fishing despite the diminishing returns, or cut your losses and do something else for a living. The latter seems reasonable, but bear in mind that commercial fishing involves a large capital investment in a boat. Selling that boat for decent money depends on someone else wanting to buy it, which is highly unlikely with the fishery in decline.
The government will step in at some point, having detected the situation via its AR-7(b) vote-sensing radar. Fishing will be regulated, and a common way to do that is to impose quotas on the catch, aiming to stop the decline in population. Basically, this worsens the economic plight of the fishermen, and really depresses the value of the fishing equipment. Quotas are assigned to individual fisherman by government decree, thus slashing earning potential-- still without benefit if you stop fishing (or if there is, it will be an expensive public bail-out, like the dairy herd buyouts back in the 80's). The incentive to illegally exceed the quota is immense.
What the government should do is assign individual tradable quotas, or ITQs (thanks to the Knowledge Problem article for the term), which entitle the holder to a certain portion of the total allowed catch, which is then scientifically decided upon every year. Being tradable, you can sell your ITQ to someone else on the open market, thus finally giving people a chance to get out of the business with some money to show for it. The fundamental problem is that too many people are trying to make a living catching fish, and ITQs are the obvious and fair way to let fisherman sell out, and simultaneously reduce the fish harvest to a sustainable level. Illegal overfishing would not only reduce future income, but also decrease the future value of the ITQ, and that's aside from the danger of getting 'caught.' With the economic picture no longer neither dire, nor worsening, the incentive to cheat is minimal.
The solution is obvious. So go forth, my loyal readers, and make the government implement such things.
If you read the entry at Insults Unpunished, then you're probably wondering what I think of Robert Prather's solution, which is fish farming. Fish farming is good, but that's a topic for another day...
Posted by Mitch at November 23, 2003 11:59 PM