Onshore benefits from fishing: Tracking value from the northern shrimp fishery to communities in Newfoundland and Labrador

摘要

Most fisheries assessments focus on biological and ecological conditions, fishery impacts and performance. Economic and social conditions and outcomes, however, are rarely explicitly tracked or evaluated. Using data from the Canadian northern shrimp inshore fleet, from employment statistics, and from Newfoundland and Labrador municipal budgets, this paper examines links between harvesting and post-harvesting economic activities and municipal infrastructure and services within adjacent onshore communities. The broad geographic distribution of home ports and landing destinations resulted in extensive economic ripple effects in areas such as food retail, shipyard maintenance and fuel services, which amounted to almost $9,000,000 in onshore expenditures distributed among 15 landing ports in 2014. Additionally, because tax payments from shrimp processing plants impact municipal budgets and services, the findings show that community-level benefits can be tracked and measured, with the implication that fisheries management objectives, such as supporting adjacent communities, are also achievable and measurable. While the impacts from a recent decline of the northern shrimp inshore fishery are stark for adjacent communities, the two decades of substantial contributions from this fishery were made possible because policy decisions at both the provincial and the federal level were explicitly developed to support fishing communities.