Future Fisheries Management
In March 2023, the Mercatus Center at George Mason University and the Center for Governance and Markets at the University of Pittsburgh launched a joint project to advance sustainable solutions to the problem of global overfishing. The project was prompted, in part, by the World Trade Organization’s Agreement on Fisheries Subsidies, which is for many a test of the WTO’s ability to reach effective multilateral agreements. It was also motivated by an interest in exploring and applying the Nobel Prize–winning ideas of Elinor Ostrom about common-pool resource problems. These two broad goals put in tension effective top-down governance with bottom-up fisheries management practices and self-governance. Convening an interdisciplinary group of experts from academia, NGOs, and international institutions, Mercatus and CGM formed a solutions-oriented workshop to take up these concerns.
Under the banner Future Fisheries Management, the workshop has published 16 issue briefs to date that focus on key aspects for policymakers and stakeholders. Christine McDaniel (Mercatus) and Ilia Murtazashvili (CGM) co-direct the workshop and have condensed the key findings of these briefs into their newly published executive summary: Beyond Adoption: Closing the Gaps in the WTO Fisheries Subsidies Agreement.
- Courtney Carothers, University of Alaska Fairbanks, Centering Indigenous and Community Fisheries in Global Fisheries Governance
- Bubba Cook, World Wildlife Fund, The WTO Needs to Impose Transparency Requirements for Fishing Subsidies
- Adam Crepelle, Southern University Law Center and SULC’s Native American Law and Policy Institute, The Never-Ending Struggle for Tribal Fishing Rights
- Mark Godfrey, A WTO Deal on Fisheries Subsidies Should Require Transparency in Access Agreements
- Andrew Johnson, MarFishEco Fisheries Consultants Ltd., External Fleets, Subsidies, and the Perpetuation of Unfair Deals
- M. Krishnan, Infinite Sum Modeling Inc., and Badri Narayanan Gopalakrishnan, Oregon State University, Indian Fisheries in the Context of WTO Regulations
- Nick Loris, C3 Solutions, Paying People Not to Fish: Using Buyback Programs to Curb Overfishing
- Elizabeth Mendenhall, University of Rhode Island, Advancing the International Law of the Sea to Address Illegal, Unreported, and Unregulated Fishing
- Ilia Murtazashvilli, University of Pittsburgh, Elinor Ostrom on the High Seas
- Pablo Obregon, Conservation International, Jurisdictional Initiatives Can Catalyze Holistic Fisheries Improvement
- Paige Roberts, What to Do When Small-Scale Fishing Is Not So Small
- Mercedes Rosello, University of Lincoln Law School, Can the WTO Help Fight IUU Fishing through Clarity-Enhancing Market Measures?
- Bradley Soule and Christine McDaniel, Mercatus Center, Laudable Agreement to End Fisheries Subsidies Has Big Loopholes
- U. Rashid Sumaila, University of British Columbia, Reducing the Impact of Subsidies on Fishing Activity: Advances and Challenges
- D.G. Webster, Dartmouth College, Fixing Global Fisheries: Reconciling Domestic Incentives and International Commitments
- Kerrlene Wills, UN Foundation, Navigating the WTO’s Illegal, Unreported, and Unregulated Prohibition for Countries in the Caribbean Community
Mercatus has also published a working paper by Pablo Paniagua and Veeshan Rayamajhee, Governing the Global Fisheries Commons and three commentary pieces by Christine and Michael Puttre in Mercatus' online magazine, Discourse.