Univ of Washington Urges Fishermen to Diversify Permits Across Multiple Species to Preserve Income
SEAFOODNEWS.COM by John Sackton Sept. 20, 2017
A team of scientists at the University of Washington have published a study in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences analyzing harvester revenue for the past 30 years in fisheries off Alaska.
The study showed that harvesters who purchased multiple permits across fisheries and diversified their catch saw much less income volatility than those who specialized in fishing a single species.
Their paper is the first to track the effect of fishing practices on individuals, rather than fishing fleets or communities.
"Previous work has shown that individuals who fish commercially have higher income variability than farmers. Our analysis showed that fishers holding single permits expose themselves to exceptional risk of high year-to-year income variability" said lead author Sean Anderson, who conducted this research...
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