WEAI/AERE 2009 - Individual Paper Abstract
Title: The Efficiency Gains from Coordinating Effort in a Fishery: Evidence from the Chignik Salmon Cooperative
Author(s): Robert T. Deacon, Dominic P. Parker, and Christopher Costello, University of California, Santa Barbara (Photos: Chris Costello/Bob Deacon)
Abstract: We examine an emerging fishery management instrument that allocates catch shares to sub-sectors or groups within the fishery, e.g., harvesters' associations of cooperatives, and allows individual harvesters to join, or not, voluntarily. Coordination by those who join can enhance rents by minimizing the race to fish and by overcoming problems of collective action. We develop a game theoretic model of the initial decision to join or not, and the subsequent decision of how joiners and non-joiners will deploy their fishing effort. The analytics give rise to a number of predictions regarding membership, fishing intensity, efficiency, public input provision, and profitability in each sector. We test these predictions with a novel data set derived from the Chignik Sockeye Salmon Cooperative which operated from 2002-2004 in Chignik, Alaska. Using these data and data from other nearby salmon fisheries we test for effect of the Chignik co-op on: the value of salmon fishing licenses, consolidation of fishing effort, coordination by co-op members to slow the rate of fishing and coordination to avoid inefficient spatial allocations of effort. We also present empirical results on the co-op's effect on the prices paid by processors and on the attributes of joiners vs. non-joiners, as well as anecdotal evidence on the co-op's provision of public inputs. Overall, the evidence indicates that the cooperative achieved significant efficiencies in the allocation of effort and that the nature of these efficiencies agrees with predictions from the theoretical model.