Is FAD fishing an economic trap?
I have a small break on climate change in tuna Pacific fisheries blogs to touch on another of my (too many?) interests: FAD fishing (something that fascinates me as it radically changed the way and the economics of how we fish tuna during the 30 years I have been in it – I’ve written lots about it)
The title of this post comes from a paper co-written by my friend and fellow dub-head Alex Tidd, who always seems to be doing cool research. The full name of the paper states: Is FAD fishing an economic trap? Effects of seasonal closures and other management measures on a purse-seine tuna fleet. The study focuses on the IOTC, a very different (and smaller) beast than our WCPFC… yet I would love to see this work done here.
This figure definitively represents the full extent of their approach to the question.
Three-step modelling approach. signs + and – indicate the expected causal effect of variables; FE, Fixed-effect models; GAM, General Additive Model; RF, Random Forest; GBM, Gradient Boosting Model.
And as usual, I recommend you read the original (or ask me to send it to you). I just quoted below the abstract and the key parts I find interesting.
Abstract
The management of fish aggregating devices (FAD) creates heated debates in tuna fishery management organizations striving to reduce the number of deployed floating objects. Through several econometric models and a machine learning approach, we evaluate the consequences of three management scenarios on the catch and profit of the French purse-seine fleet operating in the Indian Ocean:
(1) a half reduction in the number of authorized buoys per vessel, (2) a 72-day closure of FAD fishing with and (3) without re-allocation of effort on free schools.
The results show a significant decrease in fleet profits by 7%, 10% and 18%, respectively. We hypothesize an “economic trap” of FAD fishing caused by the far greater efficiency of this harvesting technique for larger vessels searching for economies of scale, and by the overfished status and catch limitation of yellowfin (Thunnus albacares) and bigeye (Thunnus obesus) tunas in the Indian Ocean. The results are compared with other studies looking at the impact of FAD management measures in other oceans.
I really liked the section on the history of the evolution of FADS (Technical change and strategic efficiency of FADs) and the last paragraph summarises why they are so ubiquitous.
The use of echo-sounders has enhanced FAD efficiency by 10%, i.e., +2.0 to 2.5 tonnes per successful set, according to Wain et al. (2021). Considering the unit cost of an echo-sounder buoy is around US$ 1000–1500, with each buoy being used three or four times on average, the net revenue gain would represent between US$ 5000 and 7000 per buoy (Ibid.). The return on investment was even estimated at USD 35,000 for a USD 5200 unit cost in just one set (Gomez et al., 2020). (under script is mine)
Conclusions
"This study evaluates the consequences of several FAD management measures on the economic performance of the French PS fleet in the Indian Ocean. It suggests that there is an economic trap of FAD fishing because of far greater efficiency compared to free school sets and because of binding constraints coming from other conservation measures such as the TAC on yellowfin tuna. On the basis of fixed-effect models and a machine-learning approach (random forest and gradient boosting models), we first demonstrated the relationship between the aggregate number of deployed buoys and the increasing FAD fishing strategy. The main outcome lies in a greater proportion of skipjack and small tuna caught by PS vessels. Despite lower unit prices, fishing smaller tunas on FADs is rewarded with the greater efficiency and higher profits.
We built three scenarios of possible FAD management measures in the Indian Ocean: a half reduction in the number of authorized buoys for the fleet with no YFT quota limitation, a yearly 72-day FAD fishing ban with re-allocation of effort on free schools and without such effort transfer, the vessels staying at port during 2.5 months every year. The incurred profit loss would be −7.1%, −9.7% and −18.2% respectively. The economic consequences could also be detrimental to coastal states relying on tuna landings (e.g. the Seychelles and Mauritius economies may be heavily affected). Despite the consensus about the excessive use of FADs, more scientific knowledge is required to support the RFMO decision-making process before implementing any stringent regulation that might produce economic damage for both distant fleets and coastal states.
Some authors suggested to replace FAD closures by FAD set limits, which could effectively reduce the fishing effort on FADs and avoid unintended consequences for other species and for some tuna fishery-dependent economies.
I personally agree with the idea of FAD set limits… yet as usual… the issue of enforcement is fundamental as there is a whole underground economy of FAD data and horse-trading among skippers and owners of access to FADs position and volume of fish underneath by trading the access code of particular FAD, so whoever pays can see it f the owner is either fishing far or transhipping somewhere and suspect that the fish underneath may move to another one… remember we have anywhere in between 20000 to 40000 deployments every year (so I suspect more that 100000) floating around in the region.
PNA is giving FAD management a go by enforcing a PNA FAD Buoy Register. While there are technological challenges in terms of monitoring and control, the outcomes will help adjust the otimal management strategy.
Never a dull moment in tuna fisheries