Using examples from more than a dozen fisheries, we highlight the failures of ‘command control’ management and show that approaches that empower fishers with the incentives and the mandate to be co-custodians of the marine environment can promote sustainability. Evidence is provided that...

Using a model of nonlinear decay of the stock pollutant, and starting from the same initial conditions, the paper shows that an optimal tax that corrects for both stock and flow externalities may result in a lower tax, fewer cumulative emissions (less decay) and higher output at the steady state...

The paper reviews existing allocation mechanisms in the five tuna regional fisheries management organizatins and shows that although they have adopted different approaches all have failed to prevent overcapacity and, or some stocks, overexploitation. As an alternative, it is proposed that each...

A new method is introduced and applied to analyse changes in productivity of firms harvesting a natural capital stock. The index-number technique decomposes the contributions of output prices, variable input prices, fixed inputs and productivity to firm profits, adjusted for changes in the...

The paper analyzes how social barriers to communication affect economy-wide productivity and factor accumulation. Using a dynamic model of an economy that includes a reproducible capital stock (physical or human) and effective labor, a negative relationship is shown to exist between social...

We contribute to the understanding of marine reserves and the management of renewable resources with uncertainty. We show that the key benefit of reserves is that they increase resilience, or the speed it takes a population to return to a former state following a negative shock. Resilience can...

We examine how scarcity pricing can be used to assist with urban water demand management in Sydney in low rainfall periods using an estimated aggregate daily water demand function. Modelling shows that current water supplies and water prices are inadequate to prevent Sydney reaching critically...

The paper presents the first ex-post analysis of profit and productivity of individual vessels following a vessel or licence buyback in a fishery. Using individual firm-level data for the period 1997-2000, the paper analyzes a "natural experiment" of the effects of a 1997 scheme to reduce...

The paper develops a benchmarking framework to improve fisheries governance and promote resilient ecosystems and profitable fisheries. The benchmarking includes five key components: accountability; transparency; incentives; risk assessment and management; and adaptability. Collectively, these...

The paper provides the first ex-post estimates of the effects on technical efficiency of input controls in a fishery. Using individual vessel data from the northern prawn fishery of Australia for the years 1990–1996 and 1994–2000, a stochastic production frontier is estimated to analyse the...