Interest is expanding for the potential role of estuaries, particularly seagrass and salt marsh habitats, to sequester carbon, mitigate ocean acidification, and support abundant fisheries. The important functions of estuaries are part of a broader set of ecosystem services, or benefits to humans, which are regulated by ocean and watershed...
Small-scale fisheries around the world are increasingly facing pressures from a range of environmental, economic, and social sources. In order to sustain the societal benefits of small-scale fisheries, it is imperative to understand how fishing communities adapt to disturbances. Fishermen often catch multiple different species as an adaptation technique because...
Humans are increasingly considered more than simply “part of the ecosystem” by natural scientists and natural resource managers. However, the integration of economic and social sciences into Integrated Ecosystem Assessments (IEAs) is advancing at different rates worldwide. Over the past several years, The U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)...
This research incorporates unique household survey data and a discrete shift in fisheries management into a model of migration in order to analyze the drivers of outmigration in rural Alaskan communities that traditionally depend on fisheries for income. Although there is evidence that a transition to rights-based management decreases the...
Researchers rely on bioeconomic models to guide research and generate fishery management advice for commercial fisheries. Due partly to a paradigm shift towards ecosystem based fishery management, increasing complexity in the characteristics of the problems has meant that bioeconomic simulation models are becoming more prevalent in the fisheries literature. However...
General population stated preference surveys are generally drawn from random samples that typically contain a large number of urban households relative to rural households due to the spatial distribution of populations. Given this, it is important to understand and assess whether differences in the preferences and values these two populations...
Many fishermen diversify their income by fishing in more than one fishery which can significantly reduce year-to-year variation in income. However, opportunities to diversify have become more limited as access to fisheries has become more restricted. The implementation of catch share systems could further reduce diversification if those who remain...
The Alaska non-pollock multi-species catcher processor trawl fishery, referred to as the Amendment 80 fishery since 2008, is an endlessly fascinating subject from the perspective of an economist. A diverse group of companies and vessels, emphasizing different species mixes from a multi-species ecosystem, targets fish across the Eastern Bering Sea,...
This document provides details of the Scientific and Social Programs at the NAAFE Forum 2015, Economic Sustainability, Fishing Communities, and Working Waterfronts, held in Ketchikan, Alaska, May 20-22, 2015. The conference was organized by Keith Criddle and Quentin Fong, University of Alaska Fairbanks, School of Fisheries and Ocean Sciences, with...