Bioeconomic Management and Fishing Selectivity: An Application to the European Hake Fishery

Abstract

The bioeconomic management in a fishery with intra-species selectivity is examined. As opposed to other works, we consider a model in which the fishing technology affects resource`s growth not only through the production function, but also through the natural growth rate of the marine resource. The analysis is applied to the European Southern hake stock (merlucius merlucius). The activity of the fleets involved in the fishery has different impacts on marine resource and the degree of selectivity of their gears is included in the economic analysis. The results show that if this fleet improves its degree of fishing selectivity, the level for the marine resource will increase.