History of the West Coast groundfish trawl fishery: Tracking socioeconomic characteristics across different management policies in a multispecies fishery

The Pacific groundfish fishery management plan was first approved in 1982, formalizing what would become one of the most economically important fisheries on the West Coast of the U.S. In 2015, the fishery as a whole generated approximately $170 million in income and supported almost 3,000 jobs. Since its inception, the fishery management plan has been amended more than 30 times, transforming a fishery characterized by high discards and overcapacity into one managed under a catch share program that was designed to reduce fishing capacity, help rebuild overfished stocks, and provide for a viable, profitable, and efficient fishery. This paper reviews historical management measures as well as changes in both the fishery resource and the operational characteristics of fishery participants, such as rebuilding stocks, reduced bycatch, seasonality of catch, diversification, and revenues. Observed changes vary across sector and target species, but economic data highlight, among other findings, that consolidation has occurred across shorebased sectors, the seasonality of landings has shifted for whiting sectors, and fleet-wide days at sea have decreased for the non-whiting groundfish fleet. Though these changes cannot be directly attributed to any single management measure, the transition to catch shares coincided with increasing economic benefits to many harvesters and communities in a fishery that was declared an economic disaster less than two decades ago. This review can serve as a resource for managers, stakeholders, and researchers involved in developing, implementing, and analyzing regulations in complex multispecies fisheries.