A new report on catch shares — the Obama administration's high-priority commitment to re-engineer and essentially privatize America's fisheries into a system that functions like a commodities market — acknowledges the socio-economic risks in rushing changes fraught with danger for fishing communities.
Produced last summer and fall during chaotic, climactic votes by the New England Fishery Management Council to bring a hybrid catch share system to the New England groundfishery, the joint report by the Meridian Institute and MRAG Americas repeatedly urged caution.
"Catch shares must be designed carefully to maximize the potential benefits and avoid adverse impacts," was one conclusion of the researchers. They reviewed the experiences of eight fisheries in the U.S., Canada, Iceland and Australia that have made — or are in the process of making — the conversion to catch share regulatory systems.