IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ags/rffdps/10451.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Fishing Quota Markets

Author

Listed:
  • Newell, Richard G.
  • Sanchirico, James N.
  • Kerr, Suzi

Abstract

Fisheries worldwide continue to suffer from the negative consequences of open access. In 1986, New Zealand responded by establishing an individual transferable quota (ITQ) system that by 1998 included 33 species and more than 150 markets for fishing quotas. We assess these markets in terms of trends in market activity, price dispersion, and the fundamentals determining quota prices. We find that market activity is sufficiently high to support a competitive market and that price dispersion has decreased over time. Using a 15-year panel dataset, we also find evidence of economically rational behavior through the relationship between quota lease and sale prices and fishing output and input prices, ecological variability, and market interest rates. Controlling for these factors, our results show an increase in quota prices, consistent with increased profitability. Overall, the results suggest these markets are operating reasonably well, implying that ITQs can be effective instruments for efficient fisheries management.

Suggested Citation

  • Newell, Richard G. & Sanchirico, James N. & Kerr, Suzi, 2002. "Fishing Quota Markets," Discussion Papers 10451, Resources for the Future.
    • Handle: RePEc:ags:rffdps:10451
    DOI: 10.22004/ag.econ.10451
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://ageconsearch.umn.edu/record/10451/files/dp020020.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.22004/ag.econ.10451?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Robert W. Hahn, 1984. "Market Power and Transferable Property Rights," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 99(4), pages 753-765.
    2. Batstone, C J & Sharp, B M H, 1999. "New Zealand's quota management system: the first ten years," Marine Policy, Elsevier, vol. 23(2), pages 177-190, March.
    3. Fama, Eugene F., 1998. "Market efficiency, long-term returns, and behavioral finance," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 49(3), pages 283-306, September.
    4. Parzival Copes, 1986. "A Critical Review of the Individual Quota as a Device in Fisheries Management," Land Economics, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 62(3), pages 278-291.
    5. Curtis Carlson & Dallas Burtraw & Maureen Cropper & Karen L. Palmer, 2000. "Sulfur Dioxide Control by Electric Utilities: What Are the Gains from Trade?," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 108(6), pages 1292-1326, December.
    6. Goetzmann, William N, 1993. "Accounting for Taste: Art and the Financial Markets over Three Centuries," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 83(5), pages 1370-1376, December.
    7. Weitzman, Martin L., 2002. "Landing Fees vs Harvest Quotas with Uncertain Fish Stocks," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 43(2), pages 325-338, March.
    8. Jon Karpoff, 1984. "Low-Interest Loans and the Markets for Limited Entry Permits in the Alaska Salmon Fisheries," Land Economics, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 60(1), pages 69-80.
    9. Stavins, Robert, 2004. "Environmental Economics," RFF Working Paper Series dp-04-54, Resources for the Future.
    10. Quinn Weninger, 1998. "Assessing Efficiency Gains from Individual Transferable Quotas: An Application to the Mid-Atlantic Surf Clam and Ocean Quahog Fishery," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 80(4), pages 750-764.
    11. Batstone, C. J. & Sharp, B. M. H., 2003. "Minimum information management systems and ITQ fisheries management," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 45(2, Supple), pages 492-504, March.
    12. Porter, Robert H, 1995. "The Role of Information in U.S. Offshore Oil and Gas Lease Auctions," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 63(1), pages 1-27, January.
    13. Squires Dale & Alauddin Mohammad & Kirkley James, 1994. "Individual Transferable Quota Markets and Investment Decisions in the Fixed Gear Sablefish Industry," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 27(2), pages 185-204, September.
    14. Oates, Wallace E & Portney, Paul R & McGartland, Albert M, 1989. "The Net Benefits of Incentive-Based Regulation: A Case Study of Environmental Standard Setting," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 79(5), pages 1233-1242, December.
    15. Case, Karl E & Shiller, Robert J, 1989. "The Efficiency of the Market for Single-Family Homes," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 79(1), pages 125-137, March.
    16. Susan Athey & Jonathan Levin, 2001. "Information and Competition in U.S. Forest Service Timber Auctions," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 109(2), pages 375-417, April.
    17. Orazem, Peter & Miranowski, John, 1986. "An Indirect Test for the Specification of Expectation Regimes," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 68(4), pages 603-609, November.
    18. John W. Pratt & David A. Wise & Richard Zeckhauser, 1979. "Price Differences in almost Competitive Markets," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 93(2), pages 189-211.
    19. Oscar R. Burt, 1986. "Econometric Modeling of the Capitalization Formula for Farmland Prices," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 68(1), pages 10-26.
    20. Julian M. Alston, 1986. "An Analysis of Growth of U.S. Farmland Prices, 1963–82," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 68(1), pages 1-9.
    21. A. Denny Ellerman & Juan-Pablo Montero, 2002. "The Temporal Efficiency of SO2 Emissions Trading," Working Papers EP13, Energy Policy Research Group, Cambridge Judge Business School, University of Cambridge.
    22. Jonathan M. Karpoff, 1989. "Characteristics of Limited Entry Fisheries and the Option Component of Entry Licenses," Land Economics, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 65(4), pages 386-393.
    23. Grafton, R Quentin & Squires, Dale & Fox, Kevin J, 2000. "Private Property and Economic Efficiency: A Study of a Common-Pool Resource," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 43(2), pages 679-713, October.
    24. Anderson, James E., 1987. "Quotas as options: Optimality and quota license pricing under uncertainty," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 23(1-2), pages 21-39, August.
    25. Fama, Eugene F, 1970. "Efficient Capital Markets: A Review of Theory and Empirical Work," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 25(2), pages 383-417, May.
    26. Noll, Roger G, 1982. "Implementing Marketable Emissions Permits," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 72(2), pages 120-124, May.
    27. Anderson, Lee G., 1991. "A note on market power in ITQ fisheries," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 21(3), pages 291-296, November.
    28. H. Scott Gordon, 1954. "The Economic Theory of a Common-Property Resource: The Fishery," Palgrave Macmillan Books, in: Chennat Gopalakrishnan (ed.), Classic Papers in Natural Resource Economics, chapter 9, pages 178-203, Palgrave Macmillan.
    29. Pesando, James E, 1993. "Art as an Investment: The Market for Modern Prints," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 83(5), pages 1075-1089, December.
    30. Weninger, Quinn & Waters, James R., 2003. "Economic benefits of management reform in the northern Gulf of Mexico reef fish fishery," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 46(2), pages 207-230, September.
    31. Roll, Richard, 1984. "Orange Juice and Weather," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 74(5), pages 861-880, December.
    32. Ragnar Arnason, 1990. "Minimum Information Management in Fisheries," Canadian Journal of Economics, Canadian Economics Association, vol. 23(3), pages 630-653, August.
    33. Stavins Robert N., 1995. "Transaction Costs and Tradeable Permits," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 29(2), pages 133-148, September.
    34. Robert N. Stavins, 1998. "What Can We Learn from the Grand Policy Experiment? Lessons from SO2 Allowance Trading," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 12(3), pages 69-88, Summer.
    35. John A. List, 2003. "Does Market Experience Eliminate Market Anomalies?," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 118(1), pages 41-71.
    36. Richard Schmalensee & Paul L. Joskow & A. Denny Ellerman & Juan Pablo Montero & Elizabeth M. Bailey, 1998. "An Interim Evaluation of Sulfur Dioxide Emissions Trading," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 12(3), pages 53-68, Summer.
    37. Anthony Scott, 1955. "The Fishery: The Objectives of Sole Ownership," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 63(2), pages 116-116.
    38. Joskow, Paul L & Schmalensee, Richard & Bailey, Elizabeth M, 1998. "The Market for Sulfur Dioxide Emissions," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 88(4), pages 669-685, September.
    39. Ellerman, A.D. & Juan-Pablo Montero, 2002. "The Temporal Efficiency of SO2 Emissions Trading," Cambridge Working Papers in Economics 0231, Faculty of Economics, University of Cambridge.
    40. Froese, R. & Pauly, D. (eds.), 2000. "FishBase 2000: Concepts, designs and data sources," Monographs, The WorldFish Center, number 13988, April.
    41. H. Scott Gordon, 1954. "The Economic Theory of a Common-Property Resource: The Fishery," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 62(2), pages 124-124.
    42. Unknown, 1998. "Newsletter Fall 1998," Institute on Global Conflict and Cooperation, Working Paper Series qt98f4p1tp, Institute on Global Conflict and Cooperation, University of California.
    43. Squires, Dale & Campbell, Harry & Cunningham, Stephen & Dewees, Christopher & Grafton, R Quentin & Herrick, Samuel F & Kirkley, James & Pascoe, Sean & Salvanes, Kjell & Shallard, Bruce & Turris, Bruce, 1998. "Individual transferable quotas in multispecies fisheries," Marine Policy, Elsevier, vol. 22(2), pages 135-159, March.
    44. James L. Paddock & Daniel R. Siegel & James L. Smith, 1988. "Option Valuation of Claims on Real Assets: The Case of Offshore Petroleum Leases," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 103(3), pages 479-508.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Newell, Richard G. & Papps, Kerry L. & Sanchirico, James N., 2005. "Asset Pricing in Created Markets for Fishing Quotas," Discussion Papers 10639, Resources for the Future.
    2. Evans, Lewis & Counsell, Kevin, 2005. "Essays in Water Allocation: The Way Forward," Working Paper Series 3848, Victoria University of Wellington, The New Zealand Institute for the Study of Competition and Regulation.
    3. Robert N. Stavins, 2011. "The Problem of the Commons: Still Unsettled after 100 Years," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 101(1), pages 81-108, February.
    4. Evans, Lewis & Counsell, Kevin, 2005. "Essays in Water Allocation: The Way Forward," Working Paper Series 18943, Victoria University of Wellington, The New Zealand Institute for the Study of Competition and Regulation.
    5. repec:vuw:vuwscr:18943 is not listed on IDEAS
    6. Richard G. Newell & Kerry L. Papps & James N. Sanchirico, 2007. "Asset Pricing in Created Markets," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 89(2), pages 259-272.
    7. Catherine J. Morrison Paul & Ronald G. Felthoven & Marcelo de O. Torres, 2010. "Productive performance in fisheries: modeling, measurement, and management," Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 54(3), pages 343-360, July.
    8. Robert W. Hahn & Robert N. Stavins, 2011. "The Effect of Allowance Allocations on Cap-and-Trade System Performance," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 54(S4), pages 267-294.
    9. Harstad, Bård & Eskeland, Gunnar S., 2010. "Trading for the future: Signaling in permit markets," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 94(9-10), pages 749-760, October.
    10. Holland, Stephen P. & Moore, Michael R., 2013. "Market design in cap and trade programs: Permit validity and compliance timing," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 66(3), pages 671-687.
    11. Liu, Jing & Qin, Tianbao, 2018. "A Comparative Analysis of Fishing Rights From a Transaction Cost Perspective," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 153(C), pages 89-99.
    12. Asche, Frank & Smith, Martin D., 2010. "Trade and fisheries: Key issues for the World Trade Organization," WTO Staff Working Papers ERSD-2010-03, World Trade Organization (WTO), Economic Research and Statistics Division.
    13. Stavins, Robert, 2004. "Environmental Economics," Working Paper Series rwp04-051, Harvard University, John F. Kennedy School of Government.
    14. Holm, Petter & Raakjær, Jesper & Becker Jacobsen, Rikke & Henriksen, Edgar, 2015. "Contesting the social contracts underpinning fisheries—Lessons from Norway, Iceland and Greenland," Marine Policy, Elsevier, vol. 55(C), pages 64-72.
    15. Hintermann, Beat, 2010. "Allowance price drivers in the first phase of the EU ETS," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 59(1), pages 43-56, January.
    16. Juan-Pablo Montero, 2002. "Testing the Efficiency of a Tradeable Permits Market," Documentos de Trabajo 224, Instituto de Economia. Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile..
    17. Weninger, Quinn & Waters, James R., 2003. "Economic benefits of management reform in the northern Gulf of Mexico reef fish fishery," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 46(2), pages 207-230, September.
    18. Gary D. Libecap, 2009. "The tragedy of the commons: property rights and markets as solutions to resource and environmental problems," Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 53(1), pages 129-144, January.
    19. Olivier Rousse & Benoît Sévi, 2005. "Behavioral Heterogeneity in the US Sulfur Dioxide Emissions Allowance Trading Program," ERSA conference papers ersa05p550, European Regional Science Association.
    20. Revesz, Richard & Stavins, Robert, 2004. "Environmental Law and Policy," Working Paper Series rwp04-023, Harvard University, John F. Kennedy School of Government.
    21. Diekert , Florian & Lund , Kristen & Schweder, Tore, 2014. "From Open-Access to Individual Quotas: Disentangling the Effects of Policy Reform and Environmental Changes in the Norwegian Coastal Cod Fishery," Memorandum 07/2014, Oslo University, Department of Economics.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Resource /Energy Economics and Policy;

    JEL classification:

    • Q22 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Renewable Resources and Conservation - - - Fishery
    • Q28 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Renewable Resources and Conservation - - - Government Policy
    • D40 - Microeconomics - - Market Structure, Pricing, and Design - - - General
    • L10 - Industrial Organization - - Market Structure, Firm Strategy, and Market Performance - - - General

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ags:rffdps:10451. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: AgEcon Search (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/rffffus.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.