The Fishery Conservation and Management Act of 1976
took effect on March 1, 1977. By this Act the United
States extended its management over fisheries to 200
nautical miles from shore. Extended fishery jurisdiction
was expected to promote industry development and expand
the contribution of the fishing industry to the economies
of the coastal regions. Benefits to the Pacific Coast
groundfish industry have, however, been less than were expected
when the Act was passed.
A spatial equilibrium model was formulated for the
broader United States interregional/international groundfish
market. Two steps were involved: First, a system of
simultaneous econometric equations was estimated for each
of the three product forms—fresh and frozen cod, ocean
perch, and flounder fillets. Second, regionalized forms
of these equations were collapsed into simple equations
and combined with transportation and storage costs in a
larger mathematical programming model. The resulting
quadratic programming (QP) problem was then solved (for
each product) for the competitive equilibrium quantities
demanded and supplied, prices, and product movements.
Two objectives were achieved: A model was formulated
that accounts for most of the relevant factors influencing
the United States groundfish market; and the multiregional
nature of this market was established. The estimated
price and income elasticities were similar to
those suggested by earlier studies, and the estimated
product movements were consistent with survey data in the
Pacific Northwest.
The various policies evaluated in this study (using
the spatial equilibrium model) suggest mixed blessings to
the Pacific Coast groundfish industry. There is no
evidence to suggest that harvesting some average quantities
uniformly throughout the year would improve industry
revenues. In general, increasing Pacific Coast
landings by 30 percent (or more) would depress wholesale
revenues but substantially increase fleet revenues. On
the other hand, both wholesale and fleet revenues would
increase if at least 80 percent of the increase in landings
could be sold in markets outside the region. This
suggests that an industry policy aimed at expanding landings
on the Pacific Coast will improve revenues for all
industry participants only if access to outside markets
also takes place. / Graduation date: 1987
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:ORGSU/oai:ir.library.oregonstate.edu:1957/26751 |
| Date | 13 April 1987 |
| Creators | Adu-Asamoah, Richard |
| Contributors | Rettig, R. Bruce |
| Source Sets | Oregon State University |
| Language | en_US |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis/Dissertation |
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