سیاست اقتصادی، موسسات و توسعه شیلات در اقیانوس آرام

The South Pacific is home to the world's largest and most valuable tuna fishery. Despite this, the Pacific island countries have found it tremendously difficult to capture significant economic rents from the resource. It is argued in this paper that poor economic policy partly explains this. However, poor policies are preventing the implementation of strong, cost-effective institutions for the governance of the fishery which, coupled with strong institutions for broad social and economic governance, are required for development of the industry. Opportunities for policy reform that are likely to lead to significant gains from the fishery are highlighted.

The negotiation of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea in 1982 (which was not ratified until 1994) substantially increased the responsibility of resource-adjacent governments to manage and conserve fish stocks within their exclusive economic zone, the ocean area within 200 miles of their coastline [1]. This increased responsibility is no more extreme than for the Pacific island countries, whose waters are home to the world's largest and most valuable tuna fishery, and where ocean area of jurisdiction exceeds landmass by an average factor of 300–1 [2] (see Fig. 1). The Pacific island countries, and indeed most developing countries, have found it tremendously difficult to convert these tenured rights into concrete economic gains.It is widely understood that, unless controls are placed on fishing effort, the fishery is susceptible to the problems associated with open-access arrangements: over-exploitation and over-capitalisation [3]. At this level of use, only normal profits are made since greater than normal profits would encourage greater resource exploitation, and no resource rents are derived from the fishery. Hence, control must be placed on fishing effort. Determining the most cost-effective institutional framework (the framework of humanly devised constraints that structure political, economic and social interaction [4]) for exercising this control is hotly debated amongst economists and other social scientists. In the governance of fishery resources and indeed the governance of all natural resources, it is helpful to consider institutions of three types: property rights (the nature of an entity holding rights of decision making within the hierarchy of resource management), entitlement systems (the basis for defining shares or parts of the fishery belonging to the right holder, e.g., input versus output controls), and mechanisms for allocating and adjusting resource entitlements (procedures of allocating and adjusting entitlements can be either market or administratively based). The past couple of decades has been a period of intense learning for policy analysts, both within governments and within multinational organisations that have made loans contingent upon particular reforms being enacted. This learning has revealed the importance of open trade, macroeconomic balance, flexible labour markets, a limited role of government in production of goods and services, and an expanding role for the private sector in many activities long though to be the province of government. More recently, there has developed an appreciation that without the institutions essential to the operation of the private sector, these policy objectives will not be achieved [5]. Historically, policies of Pacific island governments have been characterised by heavy protection against imports, inflexible labour markets, large public sectors and poorly developed institutional arrangements to support private sector activities. However, this picture is changing with greater experience and an understanding of the benefits of ‘market-friendly’ institutions and policies. This improved climate for investment within the Pacific island countries provides a strengthened foundation for fisheries development in the region. However, determining optimal fisheries policies and institutional structures for governance of a fishery is notoriously difficult due to the dynamics of the biology of the fishery and fish prices, and the large and long-term nature of investments. Governance of the South Pacific tuna fishery is particularly difficult due to the multiple species of tuna, the migration of tuna stocks across 22 states and other political divisions, the migration of tuna beyond the Pacific island nations’ exclusive economic zones into wide stretches of the open seas, and the different gear types in use. Despite the complexity of the fishery, governance should still be founded on sound economic principles. The primary aim of this paper is to draw attention to areas of poor fisheries policy in Pacific island countries, to highlight the flaws in arguments resulting in these poor policies, and to show how these poor policy objectives have led to sub-optimal institutions for governance of the resource. A secondary aim of this paper is to show that a sound policy environment alone is unlikely to lead to sustainable economic development of the South Pacific tuna fishery. Sound economic policy must be coupled with strong institutions for broader social and economic coordination: security of property and contractual rights, an honest and competent bureaucracy and a reliable and independent judiciary. The paper proceeds in Section 2 with a discussion of fisheries policy in the South Pacific, highlighting principles of economic theory that are largely misunderstood or ignored. Section 2 also includes an exposition on sound policy reform. Section 3 explores the necessity of sound policy for the adoption of appropriate institutions for governance of a natural resource, using the South Pacific tuna fishery as an example. Section 4 stresses the overwhelming importance of strong institutions for broader economic governance without which individual sectors in an economy (including the fisheries sector of Pacific island economies) will not fully develop.

The Pacific island countries’ struggle to maximise economic benefits from the valuable tuna stocks that migrate through ocean areas in their jurisdiction started in the 1970s when they first attempted to extract access fees from Japanese fishing fleets. Since that time, Korea, Chinese Taipei, the United States and other distant water-fishing nations have commenced fishing in the region, increasing competition for access. Now the Pacific island nations charge distant water-fishing nations an average of three percent of net revenues for access to their waters. In reaction to such meager returns, the Pacific island countries adopted a new strategy in the 1990s of forcing domestication in the industry in an effort to duplicate distant water-fishing nation activities. This domestication has taken on a number of forms such as investing in fishing vessels, building infrastructure for tuna processing, and transshipment. Many millions of dollars of public funds have been channeled into domestication. All but a very few ventures have failed, some repeatedly. This forced domestication of fishing activities is poor policy making. It ignores the nontrivial economic principles of comparative advantage and the Tinburgen principle. Although the Pacific island countries have close proximity to the valuable resource and low labour costs, the industry is characterised by large investment costs, specific skill requirements and high volatility in fish stocks and prices. It cannot be assumed that the Pacific island countries have comparative advantage in this industry. Governments should not favour the tuna industry over other activities, as it has by investing public funds so heavily in tuna ventures. Rather, public funds should be invested in supporting the private sector, by building infrastructure, establishing essential institutions for private sector activities, and enabling them to efficiently use information to independently seek out industries with comparative advantage. These poor policies are preventing the implementation of cost-effective institutions for the governance of the fishery. Institutions designed to maximise access fees (e.g., the auctioning of fishing rights) are being ignored due to policy designed to encourage locally based foreign direct investment through cheap access and the offer of side payments (i.e., bilateral aid) to resource managers. While the importance of sound policy making and the implementation of institutions for the governance of the fishery are necessary, they are not sufficient for fisheries development. Development of any sector in an economy needs to be coupled with strong institutions for broader economic and social governance: security of property and contractual rights, a competent and honest bureaucracy, and a reliable and independent judiciary. Without a strengthening of these broader institutions in the Pacific, individual sectors in an economy will be unable to fully develop. The full potential of the South Pacific tuna fishery (and indeed any of the Pacific's natural and capital resources) will remain unrealised as private investors, local or foreign, will not have the security to invest and apply their skills and technology.