Matulich’s Research Impacts Federal Fisheries Policy
When President Bush signed the Consolidated Appropriations Act in January, he enacted into law a unique federal fisheries policy that is anchored in the research of Scott Matulich, Professor of Agricultural and Resource Economics. This policy will rationalize the most dangerous fisheries in the world -- the North Pacific crab fisheries. It is expected to generate approximately one billion dollars of new economic wealth for the State of Washington and the State of Alaska. It will help conserve the resource. And, most importantly, it will save lives.
The crab rationalization plan is the latest development in fishery rationalization, following the American Fisheries Act of 1998 (AFA). That Act was also anchored in Scott's research and policy outreach. AFA continues to have enormous economic and conservation impacts on the biggest fishery in the world, the economic benefits of which derive primarily to Washington. While AFA was a variant of Scott's research, the crab rationalization plan is built directly on his research and policy design. Passage followed a long and arduous policy debate that began four years ago. Scott participated in this debate both as a WSU Professor and as a policy adviser to the State of Alaska through an ongoing cooperative agreement between WSU and the Alaska Department of Fish and Game. What made this plan so controversial is the amount of money at stake and the challenges of designing a policy that is “win-win-win” for harvesters, processors and fishery-dependent rural coastal communities. Any of these three mutually dependent groups could be ruined by careless public policy.
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