Economic policy, institutions and fisheries development in the Pacific: WORKING PAPER

Researchers: Petersen, Elizabeth (Author)

Brief description This record describes, and links to a working paper produced through the Resource Management in Asia-Pacific (RMAP) Program based at The Australian National University in Canberra. ***** The South Pacific is home to the world's largest and most valuable tuna fishery. Despite this, the Pacific island countries have found it tremendously difficult to capture significant economic rents from the resource. It is argued in this paper that poor economic policy partly explains this. However, poor policies are preventing the implementation of strong, cost-effective institutions for the governance of the fishery which, coupled with strong institutions for broad social and economic governance, are required for development of the industry. Opportunities for policy reform that is likely to lead to significant gains from the fishery are highlighted.

Notes Credit
Funded by AusAID

Notes Purpose
The primary aim of this paper is to draw attantion to areas of poor fisheries policy in Pacific island countries, to highlight the flaws in arguments resulting in these poor policies, and to show how these poor policy objectives have led to sub-optimal institutions for governance of the resource. A secondary aim of this paper is to show that a sound policy environment alone is unlikley to lead to sustainable economic development of the South Pacific tuna fishery.

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text: westlimit=120; southlimit=-70; eastlimit=180; northlimit=90