Managing Risk, Resisting Management: Stability and Diversity in a Southern Australian Fishing Fleet

Minnegal, Monica; Dwyer, Peter D.

doi:10.17730/humo.67.1.x38g60k463p26855

Cited by 23 publications

(22 citation statements)

References 28 publications

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“…Times are changing, however, and crab collection is nowadays seen as rewarding. Thus fishers adopt diversification as way to manage risks associated with their biological and economic environments (Minnegal and Dwyer 2008).…”

Section: Coping Strategies Of the Fishing Householdsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Negotiating risk and poverty in mangrove fishing communities of the Bangladesh Sundarbans

Islam

Chuenpagdee

2013

Maritime Studies

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Small-scale fishers in Bangladesh face substantial risks due to their occupation and their geographical setting. Without any effective buffer against crises, recurring shocks and on-going risk exposure are major factors pushing fishers into poverty. Not all fishers experience these events in the same way, however, with some of them showing higher capacity to negotiate risks. In this study, we ask how fishers cope with shock, what factors differentiate them in their risk negotiations, and what implications these factors may have on poverty alleviation policy. On the basis of the study's findings, we posit that poverty alleviation in small-scale fishing communities in Bangladesh requires interventions that target not only risk minimization, but also the endowment of fishers with socio-economic capitals to help them handle varying degrees of risk and shocks. Such policies as, for instance, providing employment for fisherwomen or providing a basic social safety net will increase the overall resilience and well-being of fisher communities.

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Section: Coping Strategies Of the Fishing Householdsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Negotiating risk and poverty in mangrove fishing communities of the Bangladesh Sundarbans

Islam

Chuenpagdee

2013

Maritime Studies

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“…Climate change is likely to shift fisheries spatially and change productivity, which could lead to greater income volatility for fishers and potentially the complete loss of fisheries in areas where they had been present for generations (2,3). While formal income insurance programs such as crop insurance for farmers do not exist in fisheries, fishers may be able to reduce financial risk by diversifying their fishing activity across a variety of fisheries or areas (1,(4)(5)(6)(7)(8)(9)(10). Kasperski and Holland (1) showed that greater diversification can substantially reduce variation in interannual revenue and also the risk of having very low revenues relative to a vessel's own average revenues.…”

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confidence: 99%

Impact of catch shares on diversification of fishers’ income and risk

Holland

Speir

Agar

et al. 2017

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

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Many fishers diversify their income by participating in multiple fisheries, which has been shown to significantly reduce year-to-year variation in income. The ability of fishers to diversify has become increasingly constrained in the last few decades, and catch share programs could further reduce diversification as a result of consolidation. This could increase income variation and thus financial risk. However, catch shares can also offer fishers opportunities to enter or increase participation in catch share fisheries by purchasing or leasing quota. Thus, the net effect on diversification is uncertain. We tested whether diversification and variation in fishing revenues changed after implementation of catch shares for 6,782 vessels in 13 US fisheries that account for 20% of US landings revenue. For each of these fisheries, we tested whether diversification levels, trends, and variation in fishing revenues changed after implementation of catch shares, both for fishers that remained in the catch share fishery and for those that exited but remained active in other fisheries. We found that diversification for both groups was nearly always reduced. However, in most cases, we found no significant change in interannual variation of revenues, and, where changes were significant, variation decreased nearly as often as it increased.diversification | risk | catch shares | fisheries

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“…Extending crop insurance-like programs to commercial fisheries harvesters has been suggested (23)(24)(25)(26), but a feasibility study of a program for Bristol Bay Salmon in Alaska cast doubt on its viability. Although formal insurance programs do not exist, fishermen's fishing strategies may provide a means to reduce risk by diversifying their fishing activity across a variety of fisheries or areas (27)(28)(29)(30)(31). A growing literature suggests that fishermen or fishery managers should adopt portfolio approaches to manage species composition of catch to achieve the lowest variance in income for any level of expected return (2,(32)(33)(34)(35)(36)(37)(38).…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Income diversification and risk for fishermen

Kasperski

Holland

2013

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

213

169

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Catches and prices from many fisheries exhibit high interannual variability, leading to variability in the income derived by fishery participants. The economic risk posed by this may be mitigated in some cases if individuals participate in several different fisheries, particularly if revenues from those fisheries are uncorrelated or vary asynchronously. We construct indices of gross income diversification from fisheries at the level of individual vessels and find that the income of the current fleet of vessels on the US West Coast and in Alaska is less diverse than at any point in the past 30 y. We also find a dome-shaped relationship between the variability of individuals' income and income diversification, which implies that a small amount of diversification does not reduce income risk but that higher levels of diversification can substantially reduce the variability of income from fishing. Moving from a single fishery strategy to a 50-25-25 split in revenues reduces the expected coefficient of variation of gross revenues between 24% and 65% for the vessels included in this study. The increasing access restrictions in many marine fisheries through license reductions and moratoriums have the potential to limit fishermen's ability to diversify their income risk across multiple fisheries. Catch share programs often result in consolidation initially and may reduce diversification. However, catch share programs also make it feasible for fishermen to build a portfolio of harvest privileges and potentially reduce their income risk. Therefore, catch share programs create both threats and opportunities for fishermen wishing to maintain diversified fishing strategies.F ishing is a risky business. Not only do fishermen face the highest rate of work-related fatalities of any US industry, with a fatality rate more than 30 times higher than average (1), they face high financial risk as a result of high year-to-year variation in their income (2). In this article we focus on the latter form of risk. High annual variation in income is a problem that is common to a variety of occupations dependent on natural resources, and there has been extensive study of income risk-coping mechanisms, particularly for farmers in developing countries (3-10). Riskreduction strategies used in agriculture might also be effective in fisheries. Crop diversification is a common means of reducing risk in agriculture, taking advantage of asynchronous variation in yield-response and prices to minimize idiosyncratic risk (11-13). Another common strategy in agriculture, particularly in semiarid regions with high fine-scale variation in rainfall, is to farm a number of geographically separated plots to ensure some will be in areas with sufficient rainfall (6). McCloskey (14) argues that risk reduction was the motivation of English farmers for "scattering each man's holdings in dozens of small strips" which, although inefficient, was widely practiced. Farmers can also plant a combination of crops adapted to wet or dry conditions to mitigate the risk assoc...

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Managing Risk, Resisting Management: Stability and Diversity in a Southern Australian Fishing Fleet

Cited by 23 publications

References 28 publications

Negotiating risk and poverty in mangrove fishing communities of the Bangladesh Sundarbans

Negotiating risk and poverty in mangrove fishing communities of the Bangladesh Sundarbans

Impact of catch shares on diversification of fishers’ income and risk

Income diversification and risk for fishermen

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