Bioeconomic analysis of Maryland’s Chesapeake Bay oyster fishery with reference to the optimal utilization and management of the resource

Abstract

The present paper deals with the surplus production models of Verhulst-Schaefer and Gompertz-Fox that are applied to the Maryland’s Chesapeake Bay oyster fishery to investigate the sustainability properties of the stock and management of the fishery. The basic objective of this paper is to illustrate the way in which long run sustainability can achieve an optimum exploitation of the fishery. For this purpose, conventional economic model is used along with biological population growth model to develop a bio-economic model. The parameters of the bioeconomic model are estimated using empirical data of catch, effort and price of the Maryland’s Chesapeake Bay oyster fishery. Standard reference points are analyzed and tax policies are introduced to achieve the standard reference points. In order to achieve maximum level of profit from the fishery optimal steady state solutions i.e., optimum levels of stock, harvest and effort are determined.

Keywords: Bioeconomics, fisheries management, reference points, price function, tax