Impacts of the 2008-2009 US West Coast Salmon Ocean Fishery Closure on Salmon Troll Vessels

Suggested Bibliographic Reference: NAAFE Forum 2017 Proceedings, March 22-24, 2017. Compiled by Ann L. Shriver with assistance from Stefani Evers. North American Association of Fisheries Economists (NAAFE), Corvallis, 2017.As anthropogenic changes interact with natural climate cycles, the variability of marine ecosystems is likely to increase. This variability influences the behaviour of fishers, which can affect the profitability and sustainability of stocks and may have wider economic and ecological effects. We use data from the US West Coast salmon troll fishery before, during, and after a large-scale closure to illustrate how altered resource availability influences the behaviour of fishing vessels in heterogeneous ways. We find that vessels were less likely to participate in fishing during the closure, with >40% of vessels ceasing fishing temporarily and 17% exiting permanently. Vessels that were more dependent on salmon were more likely to cease fishing, and more diversified vessels were more likely to continue. In spite of a high level of cross-participation, we find limited evidence that vessels increased their participation in other fisheries. Ports that obtained more of their revenue from salmon troll vessels saw larger decreases in their revenue during the closure. Overall, the closure was associated with a loss of ~$43 million in fishery revenue relative to the five year period before the closure. Based on our models and the composition of the current fleet, we predict that a closure in the near future would cause another economic disaster and lead to a large fraction of vessels exiting fishing. However, our results suggest that effects on fisheries linked by cross-participation are likely to be low.