به سوی یک مدل مدیریت بازارمحور برای ذخایر ماهیهای تجاری

Management of straddling fish stocks has been noted for its political complexity. Negotiations frequently falter as each party seeks to focus upon their own individual and shorter-term goals than the collective interest of the sector. Entrenched positions are often only deepened as new entrants participate to establish their own claims to any emergent share of resource. Unsurprisingly, deadlocks are common and typically compromises are reached only after the real period of biological then economic crisis has passed. Examples to illustrate this tendency can be found in most of the world's oceans and is writ large within the current impasse over blue whiting (Micromesistius poutassou) in the North Atlantic. The development of this fishery is discussed and it is shown that despite the scope to add value to the resource base through a pattern of exploitation focussed more upon human consumption than fish meal and oil, there seems little incentive to extricate participants from the cycle of demise that has engulfed negotiations so far. In an attempt to consider how such seemingly intractable problems might be resolved, attention is next turned to the construction of a new model for resource management specifically intended to contend with the problems thrown up by straddling stocks. Central to this is the need to ensure motivation and incentivisation of value chain members in both national economic zones and international waters. It is proposed that a Multinational Resource Cooperative (MRC) is established and would be the key element in the management model. The MRC, on behalf of the national stakeholders, would auction quota so that fish enterprises can purchase quota units defined in terms of species, quantity, catch area and the time of catch. The MRC would also be financed through a quota auction fee as explained below and arrange its own quota control and enforcement services. By auctioning rights to stakeholders the MRC will enable control and enforcement of the TAC; allocations of fair national shares of resource and critically, motivate fish enterprises to devise and implement market-oriented value adding strategies. Adoption of such a scheme should result in a more efficient use of the remaining straddling stocks whilst there is still time to do so. Importantly, the proposed rent distribution mechanism would also shift the focus of negotiations from being dominated by quotas and access rights to more evident pecuniary metrics.

This paper formulates a model and outlines essential elements of a market-oriented management system intended for application where straddling fish stocks cross the borderlines of national EEZs and international waters. Fisheries management is faced with demands that are increasingly recognised as multifaceted and in which ecological, sociological and economic factors, amongst others, figure prominently. Historically, the priority has been to protect the fish stocks against over-fishing and depletion, often determined according to biological considerations and measures [1]. Where fish stocks straddle different economic zones, fisheries management is further complicated by ownership uncertainty and is often in dispute. Commonly this happens within a dynamic fishery: one where there may be an absence of any historical pattern of exploitation, or perhaps one wherein some participants have only recently engaged in the fishery, as might happen through pressures on other former alternative fisheries. In such circumstances, negotiations over ownership settlements tend to over-shadow other management demands. In the UN Law of the Sea of 1995, a consensus was reached that the management of the straddling and highly migratory fish stocks should be carried out through regional fisheries management organisations (RFMO). A review by Bjørndal et al. [2] concluded that the local problems faced during the stage of setting up regional fisheries organisations for the management of straddling and highly migratory fish stocks were much more complicated and difficult to resolve than in the case of “shared fish stocks”. The main difficulties stemmed from the larger number of players and the possibility of new members entering the regional fisheries organisations. Notwithstanding the fundamental importance of the complications of setting up RFMOs to protect the stocks, the literature dealing with straddling stocks has given no explicit attention to market-oriented management value-adding issues. Market orientation is conceptualised as a long-term organisational behaviour which performs “organisation wide generation, dissemination and responsiveness to market intelligence” [3] and [4]. Capturing added values in the market through differentiation and market orientation is all about long-term business learning [5]. Market-orientated management schemes, when applied to the fishing industry setting, motivates enterprises to add to the total resource value by maximising profit from the limited fish quotas through identifying and responding to changes in what the market values. Typically, this will be driven by entrepreneurial incorporation of responses to changes in market-based phenomena such as consumption preferences, cost differentials and competing values. A market-oriented management model therefore should improve both the freedom and flexibility to enable enterprises to adopt their perceived optimal marketing strategy whilst, at the same time, recognising the wider management objectives of the fishery, including any total allowable catch (TAC) and its allocation to all other stakeholders, countries and enterprises alike. This paper discusses the relationships between present management practices of straddling stocks and business enterprise value-adding behaviour and is illustrated by the contemporary and contentious case of the Atlantic blue whiting (Micromesistius poutassou) fishery. This is then developed with the presentation of a market-orientated value-adding (MOVA) management model of straddling fish stocks wherein a Multinational Resource Cooperative (MRC) plays a key role as an executive RFMO body.

The management of straddling fish stocks has been shown to be politically very complicated and the multinational negotiating parties from an admixture of governmental and business interests often tend to converge in deadlock. This tendency frequently results from individual short-term self-interests in one single negotiation arena. Further impetus to deadlock stems from the fact that both politicians themselves and fish businesses tend to have a shorter lifespan for net present value calculations than the recovery period of most fish species. Negotiating deals are typically only resolved once economic and biological crises have become sufficiently large for the parties to realise that compromise agreements have to be found. Unfortunately for all, this is commonly only after the critical period during which retrieval would have been feasible. Fishery management history has many examples of such cases; ranging from Antarctic whaling in the 1950s up to contemporary management of whaling (still), tuna, cod and indeed most other swimming creatures around the globe. The case study of the fishery for North Atlantic blue whiting presented in this paper highlights that once again, a further crisis point is present; and some might say has passed. The present deadlocked management situation and fishing effort are combining to threaten the fish stock and its longer-term sustainability and thereby negate potential market value-adding opportunities, even before these have had any full-scale empirical evaluation. Whilst the case has emphasised the circumstances of blue whiting, there are wider lessons to be drawn, and which might build upon experience from other fish stocks which have also failed to fully exploit their added value potential. Central to this stage of promoting adding value is the need to emplace resource management mechanisms that will stimulate incentives to take such market-oriented initiatives and to discourage retention of past practices more for reasons of lethargy and complacency than merit. This paper contends that the model presented above is one such possible mechanism. Its intended aims to reduce the barriers to negotiation and encourage longer-term strategies that improve the biological and economic sustainability of straddling fish stocks are important in seeking to avoid the stalemates all too common and evident in the past. Critical to this realisation is the motivation and incentivisation of value chain members in both national economic zones and international waters. Implementing an MRC is perhaps the most important organisational thrust in the management model which on behalf of the national stakeholders may arrange auctions where fish enterprises can purchase quota units defined in terms of species, quantity, catch area and the time of catch and might also arrange its own quota control and enforcement services. Experiments show that actors demand a much higher price for endowed goods than what they would be willing to pay for the same good at the market place. The same is usually not true when the object of the trade is notional tokens [22]. The object of today's negotiations over blue whiting is quota volume and accession rights to fishing grounds. However, the negotiating model proposed implies a more explicit focus for negotiations: value as expressed in monetary worth. Negotiating money has more inherent flexibility and introduces more scope for resolution and compromise, possibly through the use of “negotiation facilitators” (side payments) as proposed by [23] Through the auction, stakeholders are given opportunities to (i) control and enforce the TAC; (ii) allocate fair national shares of the total resource rent in a dynamic, ecologically responsive, system and, (iii) motivate fish enterprises to carry out market-oriented value-adding business operations through extended operational freedom to use their quota purchased in the auction. The auction mechanism also gives stakeholders the opportunity for management of catching capacity on a national level, commensurate with each nation's share of the total quota. The proposed mechanism satisfies the main conclusion in a study by Munroe et al. [23] that “stable cooperative management of shared fish stocks is required, if these resources are to be exploited on a sustainable basis” Through these innovations it is contended that the greater degree of attachment and control extended to relevant user groups will tend to promote a more efficient pattern of resource utilisation and will become increasingly driven by market-oriented strategic vision than simply continuation of past periods of cyclical deadlock and intransigence.