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Fisheries policy outside the EU: A Briefing


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https://iea.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/IEA-Briefing-Fisheries-.pdf
Executive Summary: 

  • Whatever trade arrangement the UK decides to adopt with the EU post-Brexit, the UK government will have authority over fisheries policy.

  • Under the EU’s Common Fisheries Policy (CFP), after many years of stock decline, there has been a recent stabilisation and even increase in stocks. However, the CFP is not an effective way for managing fishing rights.

  • Other countries such as Iceland have more effective policies that lead both to sustainable management and also reduce conflict between different interests.

  • The UK should adopt a tradable quota share system whereby quotas are allocated as a share of the annual total allowable catch in perpetuity.

  • Such a system mirrors the way in which property rights on land encourage sustainable farming.

  • Under such a system the quota-holders have an incentive to agree the total allowable catch to maximise sustainability.

  • In-shore fisheries might be better managed in other ways with self-management often being more sustainable than government regulation.

  • Having determined the principles by which the system should operate, there are a number of practical difficulties that need to be addressed. These are important issues, but need not get in the way of the development of an effective and sustainable property-rights based system for allocating fishing rights


This paper featured in The Times and City AM.

Academic and Research Director, IEA

Philip Booth is Senior Academic Fellow at the Institute of Economic Affairs. He is also Director of the Vinson Centre and Professor of Economics at the University of Buckingham and Professor of Finance, Public Policy and Ethics at St. Mary’s University, Twickenham. He also holds the position of (interim) Director of Catholic Mission at St. Mary’s having previously been Director of Research and Public Engagement and Dean of the Faculty of Education, Humanities and Social Sciences. From 2002-2016, Philip was Academic and Research Director (previously, Editorial and Programme Director) at the IEA. From 2002-2015 he was Professor of Insurance and Risk Management at Cass Business School. He is a Senior Research Fellow in the Centre for Federal Studies at the University of Kent and Adjunct Professor in the School of Law, University of Notre Dame, Australia. Previously, Philip Booth worked for the Bank of England as an adviser on financial stability issues and he was also Associate Dean of Cass Business School and held various other academic positions at City University. He has written widely, including a number of books, on investment, finance, social insurance and pensions as well as on the relationship between Catholic social teaching and economics. He is Deputy Editor of Economic Affairs. Philip is a Fellow of the Royal Statistical Society, a Fellow of the Institute of Actuaries and an honorary member of the Society of Actuaries of Poland. He has previously worked in the investment department of Axa Equity and Law and was been involved in a number of projects to help develop actuarial professions and actuarial, finance and investment professional teaching programmes in Central and Eastern Europe. Philip has a BA in Economics from the University of Durham and a PhD from City University.


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