Impacts of Rationalization on Exposure to High Winds in Alaska’s Crab Fisheries

ABSTRACT

Objectives: Safety at sea is an often overlooked aspect of well-being that fisheries management actions can affect, even when management actions are not intended to affect safety. Catch shares management has been associated with longer fishing seasons and a decline in the intensity of competition among fishers. This study assesses changes in exposure of Alaska’s commercial crab fisheries to relatively high-risk weather conditions after rationalization, or catch shares management, was implemented.

Methods: We compare the rates of fishing in high-wind conditions in the Bristol Bay red king and the Bering Sea snow/tanner crab fisheries pre- and post-rationalization. We also compare results to a portion of the crab fishery that did not undergo the same change in management.

Results: The rate of high wind fishing in the snow/tanner crab fishery fell post-rationalization, but increased in the red king crab fishery.

Conclusion: When the red king and snow/tanner crab fisheries are considered together, rationalization led to longer seasons and improved flexibility to choose when to fish according to weather conditions. The snow crab fishery experienced a marked decline in higher-risk fishing after rationalization. Results are contrary to expectations for the king crab fisherybecause the flexibility in trip timing provided by the program produced a shift in their season toward winter months when average wind speeds are higher.

KEYWORDS:

• Safety
• risk
• weather
• fisheries management
• crab rationalization

Acknowledgments

We thank Jean Lee and Steve Kasperski (Alaska Fisheries Science Center) for assistance, access to the data, and helpful comments. We thank participants in the 2018 International Fishing Industry Safety and Health Conference (IFISH5) for helpful suggestions.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Data Availability Statement

The data used in this analysis are subject to confidentiality requirements set forth in The Magnuson-Stevens Act (MSA) at section 402(b), 16 U.S.C. 1881a(b). The data are available to researchers provided a researcher meets requirements for access and signs a nondisclosure agreement.

Supplementary material

Supplemental data for this article can be accessed here.

Additional information

Funding

This research was funded by NOAA Fisheries’ Office and Science and Technology and Office of Sustainable Fisheries.