Farmed Cod to restock the coast?

[stavey]

it would be a good idea ian if you could make it illegal for commercials to take such fish, i brought something similar up in a past post about anglers financing a stocking of striped bass here. or some other sport fish. the trouble with cod is it is always going to be considered a food fish {and not very sporting by the way} and there lies the biggest problem with conservation of such a species. if we had solely a fish for anglers and financed the stocking of such we could police and demand to officials that everything is done to protect them, if they did not we could bring them to rule etc. i would have no problem forking out some dosh for something like this rather than paying out for a licence for no stocks and no say like as it is at the moment....

[wurzel]

Hello Stavey,

you could take up carp fishing in commercail carp puddles, what you are suggesting amounts to the same, just on a bigger scale.

[stavey]

they do it in the states in the sea wurzel, and as you know most of the good ideas over there we adopt as well over here, eventualy......

[wurzel]

Like trick or treat

[stavey]

no i said good idea, we used to have penny for a guy did'nt we?

[Ian Burrett]

I would like to see the commercial men pay a fee linked to the tonnage of fish caught which directly funds the introduction of small fish into the sea. The more they catch the more they pay. That could promote sustainable fishing for everyone.

[Leon Roskilly]

Something along these lines Ian?

 

Communal Value

 

A Discussion document presented by the Sea Anglers’ Conservation Network

 

http://www.anglersnet.co.uk/sacn/

 

 

(Version dated 5th May 2002)

 

 

Introduction

 

The idea of a levy, based on a concept of ‘communal value’ seeks to address the injustices that occur when a number of parties attempt to competitively exploit a commonly owned, but limited resource.

 

Especially where the resource in question has a different value for each of those seeking to exploit the resource.

 

In effect, the Communal Levy is a form of compensation, paid by those extracting the resource, to the wider community, as a form of compensation to those other communal owners of the resource, who will now be denied their own equal opportunity to extract value from the resource.

 

It also changes the effect of market forces on the exploitation of the resource; balancing conflicting values and needs.

 

 

Mullet

 

As an example, let us consider mullet.

 

From a recreational angling point of view, mullet are one of the most challenging of species. To be successful, a mullet angler needs great knowledge of the fish and its habitat. Also needed is a high degree of angling skill in locating the prey, preparing the area with pre-baiting, tempting wary fish to a hook bait, and playing the strong and powerful fish on necessarily light and specialised tackle.

 

Most mullet anglers routinely return all they catch. Partly because mullet are not judged by many to be very good eating, but mostly for conservation reasons.

 

Being a fish deemed to be of little commercial value, very little research has been carried out on the species. One of the attractions of the species for sports fishermen is discovering knowledge about the species, through fishing and personal experimentation.

 

However, it is known that (in UK waters) they usually take almost ten years to reach just 3lbs in weight, and it is about this age that they first spawn (then perhaps only one year in three).

 

Evidence from tagging programmes conducted by the members of the National Mullet Club indicates that repeat captures of the same fish occur in near localities throughout the season. (This is backed up by observations of my own local group, throughout last season, of a fish easily recognisable from damage caused by an earlier fungus disease. This fish regularly visited our feeding bags, at one location, and mostly managed to avoid capture. It was given a name and almost became a pet!).

 

It is strongly suspected that the same fish return to the same area, year after year.

 

What recreational mullet anglers most desire is to catch large fish, with certificates and trophies being awarded for notable specimens.

 

With such a slow growing species populating a given area, mullet anglers recognise that returning specimens is the only way of ensuring and developing future sporting opportunities.

 

To a commercial fisherman, a mullet is not a highly desirable species. Prices are generally low. If mullet were to disappear from his area, it would be of little concern to him.

 

However, given that he has already invested in the means of catching, and that anything he does catch comes to him, for all intents and purposes, at practically zero cost, and especially when TACs of his usual species etc have been exhausted. A netful of mullet, to be sold cheaply, perhaps as pot-bait, will at least provide some ‘beer money’.

 

Imagine the sense of loss that mullet angler has, when he learns that his secret bay has been netted, or the local harbour, where the kids fish, and where he caught his first ever mullet, has been emptied.

 

And the venue will not refill with fish on the next tide. The fishing has gone for a long time. The replacement of specimen sized fish is likely to take decades.

 

The anger generated is akin to that of coming back to your car to find the window smashed, the bodywork and locks damaged, hundreds of pounds worth of damage caused by someone stealing an item which they will sell for just a few pounds.

 

The mullet, like stolen goods, come free to the commercial fisherman. The loss suffered by others is of no concern to their balance sheet.

 

Unlike the car thief, the commercial fisherman is doing nothing illegal.

 

Even if he is netting where he shouldn’t, using a banned or restricted method, once he is away with his catch, there is no justice for those other ‘common owners’ of the mullet.

 

By imposing a levy on mullet, perhaps based on size of fish, location taken etc, perhaps imposed at point of wholesale, this would recognise the value of the fish to the wider group of ‘stakeholders’ in the stock, and perhaps reduce the marketability of the catch to a point where it is no longer economical for the commercial fisherman to target the species locally.

 

I have used mullet as my first example because they are the species most close to my heart, and where I see the most common incidence of injustice emanating from a species, greatly prized by one party, being destroyed almost casually by a party who has little real interest, and who obtains very little return from the destructive exploitation.

 

However, I acknowledge that mullet are a fish of minority (but growing) interest and, although serving well to illustrate the principles involved, are unlikely to provoke the kind of change which is generally needed.

 

Bass

 

Bass are arguably Europe’s most important sports fish. They are also a favourite (and trendy) culinary species.

 

However, they are still regarded as a species of little commercial interest, and therefore they are not protected by any TAC. Their minimum landing size (MLS) is well below the size of a mature breeding fish.

 

The reason for their being deemed of little commercial interest being that, until fairly recently, they tended to be found only in small, scattered, inshore shoals, likely to turn up as an added bonus in the catch of inshore fishermen, but rarely specifically targeted, certainly not as a large volume catch.

 

To increase their numbers, following consultations with both inshore fishermen and recreational anglers, nursery areas were established in certain estuaries, several years ago.

 

Both inshore fishermen and recreational anglers were persuaded to agree to legally imposed restraint in these special areas, on the understanding that the numbers of fish would increase, year upon year, and that the juveniles would return inshore as mature and sizeable fish, from their spawning. (Bass will normally live some 25 years, spawning for the first time at around age 4 or 5 years old and spawning some 15 times during their life, capable of reaching weights of over 20lbs).

 

But then the pair trawlers found the spawning shoals.

 

Now, few fish return inshore from their first spawning, many being taken by the pair trawlers still full of unspent spawn.

 

Again, the pair trawlers come across the spawning bass as a ‘free’ resource. Legally, they are able to take whatever they can (subject to some landing restrictions per boat - at least in France and the UK).

 

They take what they want with no acknowledgement of the ‘communal value’ of their catch, denied to inshore fishermen, recreational anglers, and the many livelihoods dependent on their activities. Only market pressures affect the degree of their exploitation.

 

(In response, respect for the nursery areas seems to be breaking down. Why let the fish swim off for others to harvest?)

 

Payment of a levy on this fishery would adjust the return on market value of the catch, and would be an effective way of acknowledging the interest of more efficient socio-economic exploiters of the stock.

 

I am reminded of the activities of those who steal works of art, fashioned in precious base metal, who melt down the artefacts into ingots, destroying a value much greater to others to obtain a minimal return for themselves. Happy to do so because the return is upon an even more minimal investment on their part, and does not recognise the greater value their ‘raw material’ has for others.

 

 

Other Interests

 

The experiences of the foot and mouth epidemic in the United Kingdom, in 2001, caused a seismic realisation that the socio-economic value of the countryside was no longer dominated by the food producing industry.

 

Leisure and Tourism dwarfed the farming contribution massively.

 

It is only to be hoped that such a realisation, through disaster, will not be needed to shake the foundations of the management of our commonly owned marine resources.

 

In many parts of the world, studies have shown that the economic activity from recreational angling dwarfs the returns from Commercial Fishing. When it is realised that ‘competition’ for a common resource only applies to certain stocks, then the gulf between the relative values of those specific stocks to each party is huge (and currently unacknowledged in Europe).

 

Yet it is not only recreational anglers who have a socio-economic stake in the stocks.

 

Generally, a population which is constantly faced with negative reports about how they, through their institutions, are responsible for environmental degradation, cannot feel good about themselves. The impact of our inability to manage a natural resource on our national/European psyche is out of all proportion to the benefit to the commercial exploiters of taking all they freely can.

 

Other sections of the population, other than recreational anglers, have a far more intimate stake in the management of the resource.

 

Marine divers like to visit underwater structures rich in wildlife.

 

Cetaceans, seals, otters and sea birds attract many visitors and generate substantial revenues to coastal rural areas. But the sea-life, which they come to observe, is dependent upon the good management of fish stocks, and the wider impact on the marine environment of commercial fishing activity.

 

The needs of all ‘stakeholders’ has to be valued and acknowledged within the system of stock management.

 

 

Cows

 

I am sure that you will be aware of the famous model of economics, leading to the over exploitation of an economic resource.

 

As I remember it, there is a piece of common land to which 5 farmers have access. The sustainable productivity of the common land means that the optimum number of cows it will support is 20.

 

Therefore, if each farmer grazes just four cows, the whole community benefits at the optimum return.

 

However, one farmer calculates that running a fifth cow, will not greatly effect the overall productivity (21/20) but will increase his ratio of return greatly (4/5). The cost being borne by his fellow commoners.

 

As a result of his running a fifth cow, their cows do slightly less well, the market price of cow products decreases per cow; the environment degrades and becomes less productive over time.

 

Each farmer, faced with falling productivity feels pressured to run a fifth cow.

 

Now land, which can optimally support a herd of 20 prime healthy cows, is populated with 25 sickly cows, and things are going to get steadily worse.

 

(There is a lot of analogy with what is happening to fish stocks there.)

 

However, if a ‘communal levy’ was to be imposed per cow, on a sliding scale, the levy would reflect the communal resource freed by those running less than the optimum number of cows (paid as a negative levy, or subsidy), and would deter the running of a number of cows exceeding the optimum number (collected as a levy recognising the denial of communal value to the others).

 

 

Market Value

 

As the availability of a resource diminishes, so its market value increases (I wonder how much some millionaire will one day pay for the last ever plate of cod and chips!).

 

As a resource diminishes, so its communal value increases.

 

When it is a potentially biologically renewable resource, then its value multiplies.

 

(The last sack of seed corn for next year’s harvest has considerably more ‘communal value’ than a last sack of milled flour.)

 

A levy, based on current communal value, would counteract the increasing market value of a diminishing resource, multiplying the eventual sale price and dampening demand.

 

 

Mining

 

What perplexes many outside observers is the seeming willingness of today’s fishermen to destroy the potentially infinitely renewable resource upon which their livelihoods will be dependent upon tomorrow.

 

Their incredulity that fishermen would ever be so stupid is based on the romantic assumption that all fishermen, and owners of fishing vessels, come from a line of hardy seafaring men and communities who have always been, and always will be, fishermen.

 

Increasingly, this is not the case.

 

Big boats, with expensive technology, owned by big commercial interests, is the growing truth of today’s commercial fishing.

 

In fact fishing today often seems to have more in common with the economics of mining, than the sustainable harvesting of a common renewable resource.

 

A mining operation establishes the existence of a resource with a known market value. It calculates the investment needed to extract the resource.

 

It then extracts the resource and moves on, re-deploying equipment to another mine, or being just as happy to take the return on investment and re-invest in a completely different industry, once the resource is depleted.

 

A similar situation can arise with the exploitation of fish stocks.

 

Although stocks are theoretically replenishable, there has to be a belief that sustainability will be achieved, otherwise it comes down to ‘we might as well take what value we can now, before someone else does’.

 

Rules and regulations, international agreements etc., go some way to restraining the mining instincts of investors, but as is readily observable, they are failing.

 

As the resource diminishes, and the price creeps upwards, and more (largely unenforceable and increasingly complex) regulations are put in place, so the rewards of illegal fishing, and selling onto the black fish market increases.

 

In this, it is important not to put all the blame onto the fishermen. They are merely responding to the market demand driven by investors, processors, distributors, supermarkets and ultimately consumers.

 

A levy, collected further along the supply chain, would help to kill the market demand for illegal fish.

 

This in turn would swing the pendulum back from a mining type operation, toward a sustainable harvesting operation.

 

Where the pendulum goes is dependent upon the belief that the stocks will be fairly and sustainably, and most of all effectively, managed for the benefit of all stakeholders. The concept of ‘communal value’ gives some credibility to that belief.

 

 

Application

 

Where stocks are abundant, and are not subject to destructive competition between parties who value the stocks differently, and are harvested with insignificant environmental impact, I would imagine that the ‘communal value’ would produce a neutral (zero) levy.

 

Where stocks are in danger; where they are of more value to one party than another; where harvesting involves environmental damage (eg seabed/reef damage); where society feels that harvesting has unethical side effects (eg dolphin/seabird deaths). Then there would be a proportionate levy imposed, reflecting the wider value which the community, or sections of the community feel they lose, by the exploitation.

 

Where it is desirable to actually increase exploitation for stock/environmental management purposes against a background of falling market prices (eg overabundance of whiting, destroying cod spawn/fry but abundant whiting having little sale value), then the levy would in fact be paid as subsidy, reflecting the communal value of managing the resource by exploitation.

 

 

Communal Value versus Regulation.

 

Currently regulation and market forces are the only (often conflicting) devices used to control fishing activity and to address the above (and other) problems of balancing exploitation of a common resource.

 

That is demonstrably failing.

 

An ‘arms’ race develops between those trying to conserve the resources and those trying to exploit the resource.

 

It is inevitable that regulation will always be some way behind technical developments designed to get around the restrictions of previous regulation. As a result, regulation becomes increasingly complex, unenforceable, and costly for all parties.

 

Where regulation is successful, it diminishes supply, increasing the pressure of market forces, leading to greater evasion of the regulations, again increasing the costs of enforcement.

 

At best, it displaces effort on one stock, onto another.

 

Whilst acknowledging the great difficulties in setting acceptable levels of levy, and collecting them, a levy system would be far less complex, and more responsive, than the increasing jungle of multi-layered regulation which we now have, trying to achieve the same objectives.

 

Once established, it would be far easier to adjust the imposition and level of levy, according to changing circumstances.

 

Unlike regulation, which causes market forces to respond in a counter-productive way, Communal Levy would recruit market forces to achieve the objective of its imposition.

 

Regulation, in itself makes no acknowledgement of the different needs and values of competing community interests. Where regulation is effective, this still leaves the potentially (and actually) dispossessed feeling vulnerable and unacknowledged.

 

Communal Levy would provide a mechanism of demonstrable recognition of other interests, and a focus for debate in ensuring that all stakeholders’ interests are taken into account.

 

 

Why should only Commercial Fishing be subject to a levy?

 

The levy recognises that destructive exploitation by one party denies other stakeholders enjoyment of the common benefit.

 

By and large, recreational angling has little impact. ‘Sports’ fish (such as bass, mullet, wrasse, common skate, tope) are often returned alive.

 

But, yes a contribution toward stock management is a reasonable price to pay for recognition of stakeholder status.

 

But the quantities of fish per angler, and the number of anglers fishing, make the concept of applying a levy based on catch impractical.

 

However a levy on the sale of angling equipment, or a system of licensing sea anglers would be acceptable to many, so long as this could be demonstrated as having a direct environmental benefit.

 

Where ‘exploitation’ is non-destructive (eg tourism based on observation of wildlife), it is reasonable that restraint from destructive exploitation should be recognised by the beneficiaries of such restraint.

 

Again, the availability of the stock for non-destructive exploitation implies that the stock is unavailable for destructive exploitation, and communal compensation, recognising the unavailability of the stock to the fishing industry, might seem to be appropriate.

 

However, collection of a levy is not really appropriate where no fish is taken.

 

Where stock is ‘reserved’ for such activities, perhaps in some form of ‘Marine Park’, spill-over of stock productivity into unrestricted areas would go some way in compensating commercial fishermen for their restraint.

 

 

Problems

 

Communal Levy will never be a ‘cure all’ for all problems. Acceptance of the concept will be fiercely challenged. At least initially, its value will lie in fostering debate about the issues that it seeks to address.

 

Acceptance of the concept will involve clearing many hurdles, some of which can easily be foreseen, some which will only emerge with the passage of time and the refinement of the concept.

 

Institutions for the management of fisheries have largely evolved from the strategic need to ensure that populations can be fed, in a time when fish stocks were ‘known’ to be limitless and easily regenerated.

 

As a result, their culture and mindset is fundamentally that of controlling and supporting the fishing industries in turning fish into protein.

 

They are likely to find some difficulty in dealing with a concept that places the management of the stock above the interests of the commercial exploiters, and particularly a concept that acknowledges that stakeholders, other than commercial fishermen, have a legitimate right to other ‘value’ intrinsic within the stock.

 

Fishing interests will not readily accept that they should pay a levy on stocks that they now harvest for free. At the very least, some reciprocal compensation is likely to be demanded.

 

New legislation will need to be debated and introduced. Political opposition to the concept will tend to shape the beast to a different form from that initially envisaged.

 

A mechanism for setting levy, and for paying/collecting levy will need to be constructed, this is likely to be costly.

 

Enforcement of the collection of levy will be avoided (as with all taxes). As the level of levy rises in a particular circumstance, so the pressures on the whole system will increase.

 

However, there would seem to be no fundamental reason why such a mechanism could not be adopted, opening up new possibilities for future stock management for the benefit of all immediate stakeholders, and the wider community.

 

[ 04. June 2005, 08:23 PM: Message edited by: Leon Roskilly ]

[dale]

why not put the small codling in a sea loch and net it off barring seals and the like from the loch. see how they get on....

 

could be the sea equivalent to a trout pond!

[wurzel]

Hello Leon.

You mention several times that commercial fishermen get the fish stocks for free. You try buying a fishing boat and licence, then the equipment and general running costs. add up the profit per hour per effort per investment.

They don't seem free to me.

 

Ok then so anglers are worth as much to the economy as the commercail fleet you say,I'm not so sure, so if you elimanate the commercial fleet, to acheive what you want that is what will need to be done, do you think there will be enough anglers to make up the difference.

 

Just had a thought, if it was put to the country for a vote, a bit like the EU referendum, What does the country want, a commercail fleet or recreational anglers only?

I wonder who would win.

[Ian Burrett]

dale:

why not put the small codling in a sea loch and net it off barring seals and the like from the loch. see how they get on....

 

could be the sea equivalent to a trout pond!

If you put in a barrier to stop the small Cod getting out, how could the small bait fish, and other fish, like Rays and flatties. that enter the locks to breed get in?