Benefits and Costs of Implementing the Ecosystem Approach to Fisheries

The ecosystem approach to fisheries (EAF) has been advocated widely, on the basis of its potential to meet a variety of goals, notably ecosystem health, sustainable resource use and human well-being. However, choices arise in implementation of EAF management, and each choice will produce benefits and costs. Benefits may be in terms of greater protection for a threatened species, greater long-term stability in food supply for a local community, reduced wastage or many other possibilities. Costs could include the direct costs of implementation (e. g. increased management costs) as well as the indirect or induced costs resulting from how the EAF is implemented (e. g. reduced employment and revenues in the short term). This chapter emphasizes the importance of a comprehensive assessment of these benefits and costs arising in EAF implementation, in order to improve decision making. The chapter undertakes a preliminary exploration of approaches and issues involved in such an assessment, examining four major aspects: (i) requirements, components and tools of EAF implementation having likely benefit and cost impacts; (ii) distributional implications, i.e. to whom the benefits and costs accrue, among stake-holders, inter-temporally and across spatial or administrative scales; (iii) compilation of potential EAF-related benefits and costs, grouped into ecological, economic, social and management categories; and (iv) the feasibility of various methodologies for assessing the benefits and costs of EAF implementation. The chapter also emphasizes the need for further research and analysis to develop the frameworks required for efficiently assessing the benefits and costs of EAF implementation in practical situations.