Resource Rent in Individual Quota Fisheries

Traditional fisheries management schemes generate incentives for vessels to maximize catch, resulting in rent dissipation and overcapacity. Individual vessel quota management schemes change the incentives to maximize profit and have the potential to generate resource rent and reduce capacity. An interesting question is whether it is the changed incentives due to individual quota or the capacity reduction due to transferability of individual quota that is most important in generating rent. In this study, a cost function approach is used to model and measure rent generated and potential rent in a fishery managed with individual vessel quotas.