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Introduction to Special Edition: The Oceans and National Income Accounts: An International Perspective
Get PDFIntroduction to articles in the special edition
The Role of the Ocean Economy in the National Income Accounts of Indonesia
Get PDFThis paper presents the role of the Ocean Economy in the National Income Accounts of
Indonesia including the concept and methodology used to estimate the contribution of
this ecosystem to Indonesian value added. Currently, the national income account of
Indonesia only recognizes the fishery sector. Fishery activities have been considered as
one of the sub-sectors of agricultural sector together with sub-sectors of farm food
crops, plantation or non-food crops, forestry, and livestock. There are some drawbacks
in the concept of national income accounts, since it follows the UN system of national
accounts (SNA) that recognize only economic sectors or activities which produce the
value added, while it does not recognize the ecosystems such as lakes and river
ecosystems, forests as well as terrestrial and ocean ecosystems as production sectors.
The present concept of the SNA produces an undervaluation of forest and ocean
sectors, which in turn may direct the policy makers to have a tendency to deplete the
forestry and fishery resources in order to increase the contribution of those two
sectors to the national income accounts. Otherwise, the two sectors will be allocated
small national budget for their operations. Therefore the paper concludes that a new
concept of national income accounts based on ecosystem products and services to be
developed, as a satellite account to the national income account is needed.
Furthermore the new concept of national income account for the ocean economy
should adopt the UN System of Environmental and Economic Accounts, which takes
into account the extractive and non-extractive products as environmental and
biological services in to the ocean income account. The new concept of ocean
accounting based on both extractive and non-extractive products instead of only based
on the extractive one which have market values may guarantee the sustainability of
the ocean in particular and will be good for the whole economy of the country in
generally. Hence the national income accounts of the ocean economy will show how
the blue economy or the ocean economy really function as one of the important
sectors for the whole economy of the country
The Economics of Adaptation to Climate Change in Coasts and Oceans: Literature Review, Policy Implications and Research Agenda
Get PDFSea level rise and other effects of climate change on oceans and coasts around the world are major reasons to halt the emissions of greenhouse gases to the maximum extent. But historical emissions and sea level rise have already begun so steps to adapt to a world where shorelines, coastal populations, and economies could be dramatically altered are now essential. This presents significant economic challenges in four areas. (1) Large expenditures for adaptation steps may be required but the extent of sea level rise and thus the expenditures are unknowable at this point. Traditional methods for comparing benefits and costs are severely limited, but decisions must still be made. (2) It is not clear where the funding for adaptation will come from, which is a barrier to even starting planning. (3) The extent of economic vulnerability has been illustrated with assessments of risks to current properties, but these likely significantly understate the risks that lie in the future. (4) Market-based solutions to reducing climate change are now generally accepted, but their role in adaptation is less clear. Reviewing the literature addressing each of these points, this paper suggests specific strategies for dealing with uncertainty in assessing the economics of adaptation options, reviews the wide range of options for funding coastal adaption, identifies a number of serious deficiencies in current economic vulnerability studies, and suggests how market based approaches might be used in shaping adaptation strategies. The paper concludes by identifying a research agenda for the economics of coastal adaptation that, if completed, could significantly increase the likelihood of economically efficient coastal adaptation
State of the U.S. Ocean and Coastal Economies 2016 Update
Get PDFRelative to the landmass of coastal regions, America’s coasts and oceans contribute a disproportionately high value to the United States economy. For the past fifteen years, the National Ocean Economics Program (NOEP) has compiled time-series data that track multiple indicators for economic activities, demographics, natural resource production and values, non-market values, and federal expenditures in the U.S. coastal zone on land and in the water. On our website (www.oceaneconomics.org), government agencies, academia, industry, advocacy groups and the general public representing more than 40 nations— have had interactive access to this information and used it widely for many different purposes.
This Update features highlights denoting economic changes that have occurred since our last report was issued in February 2014. We continue to measure two economies: the ocean economy, which includes all ocean-dependent activities in coastal states, and the coastal economy, which includes all economic activity in coastal states, according to geographies such as zip codes, shore adjacent and other coastal zone counties, and watersheds. In addition to updating the measures of economic activity such as employment, wages, and gross domestic product, we have updated our fisheries, offshore oil and gas, and ports and cargo data to indicate changes since our last report. Also, as we have in the past, we show sand nourishment production and price estimates; this time to track continuing changes in price and location in view of climate impacts along our nation’s coasts. We have added a new Arctic Economy page to our site and provide a brief report from it. Finally, we have been compiling federal expenditure data based on OMB annual estimates of all federal agency civilian expenditures for many years. We provide a brief summary of those data as well. The analysis presented here updates ocean economy information to 2013, the most recent available year for these data. Because of the lag in the production of ocean economy data by the federal agencies from which estimates are drawn, this report includes a new data series in the NOEP database: the Ocean Economy Coincident Index. This index utilizes more recent data on employment, establishments, and real wages to provide an indicator of trends between the most recent ocean economy data available (2013 in this report) and the most recent full year for which data are available (2014).
A Note on Data Sources: All of the data reported here except for the Arctic data is sourced from public sources, including the Bureau of Labor Statistics, Bureau of Economic Analysis, the Census Bureau, and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administrations’ Office of Coastal Management, NOAA Fisheries, Department of Interior, States of Alaska, Texas, Louisiana, California and Mississippi and Alabama for oil and gas data, beach nourishment data from West Carolina University (http://beachnourishment. wcu.edu). Thanks to Daniel Pauly and Rashid Sumalia at the University of British Columbia, for allowing us to use their Arctic fisheries data from Sea Around Us. All data is available for viewing and download on the website of the National Ocean Economics Program at www.oceaneconomics. org
Tradeable Permits for Shoreline Protection: Reshaping Regulation Under the Coastal Act for the Era of Sea Level Rise
Get PDFCalifornia’s coast is one of the state’s and the nation’s premier locations. Home to millions of people, as well as a great diversity of natural features and habitats, it is also a place that is disappearing from beneath our feet. The dynamic interactions of water and land have eroded much of the historic California coast, and sea level rise threatens a dramatic acceleration of this trend. Fighting erosion has led to more than ten percent of California’s shoreline (and over thirty percent in southern California) being transformed from natural to man-made structures that resist, at least for a time, the forces of wind and wave.
But the fortress undermines itself. Sea walls and armoring protect properties for a time, but result in accelerated erosion nearby, and eventually disrupt the dynamics of the entire coastal system. The regulatory system governing shoreline management under the California Coastal Act (“Coastal Act”) is complex and is generally designed to discourage armoring. In choosing armoring, shorefront property owners not only commit to an enormous expenditure of money to construct and maintain the structure, but also engage in a time-consuming, contentious and expensive process to get approval for their actions. The costs to the owners are matched, or exceeded, by the administrative burden borne by public agencies – in this case local governments and the California Coastal Commission – charged with granting approval.
Alternatives to coastal armoring in the form of natural infrastructure are now viable alternatives to engineered structures in many situations. Wetlands, dunes, oyster beds, and kelp forests are natural features that enhance the ability of both human and natural systems to respond to sea level rise. Such “natural infrastructure” can be cost effective, or at least cost competitive, with hard armoring responses, particularly over the extended periods required in the face of rising seas. Despite the advantages of these approaches, the regulatory regime does little to encourage their use, and they have been rarely deployed.
To achieve the Coastal Act’s purposes in an era of steadily increasing threats to shoreline properties from rising sea levels, California will have to find ways to provide incentives for property owners to deviate from business-as-usual practice of shoreline armoring. The current approach certainly permits natural infrastructure to be used, and can be seen as generally supportive of the idea, but the current process does not send strong enough signals to property owners and can take inordinate time to arrive at decisions. The time spent reviewing every single property owner’s actions will become a major burden on regulators and the regulated community as flooding events become both more common and more damaging.
We believe it is possible to do better. Similar inefficiencies in other environmental regulatory processes have led to the development of markets for tradable permits that can achieve better environmental results at lower costs. Such systems as “cap and trade” air quality regulation and transferable development rights in land use have been widely and successfully deployed in the U.S. and other countries.
In this paper we draw on this experience to propose a tradable permits system that can make shoreline protection both more available when needed and less environmentally damaging when used. We define objectives for such a system based on the principles espoused by the Coastal Act and on experience with other tradable permits. We evaluate the prototype against the known characteristics of successful permit market systems. We conclude that a market-based tradable permit system for shoreline protection for California is feasible and identify a number of legal and policy issues to be investigated further
Fish Landings at the World’s Commercial Fishing Ports
Get PDFIn 2009, the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) adopted the Agreement on Port State Measures to Prevent, Deter and Eliminate Illegal, Unreported and Unregulated (IUU) fishing (PSMA). Countries that ratify the treaty commit to exert greater control at ports over foreign-flagged vessels to detect IUU catch before it is offloaded from vessels, and prevent the ill-gotten catch from entering the world’s markets. The PSMA, when effectively implemented globally, will be a major deterrent to IUU fishing. A major challenge to selecting ports for enhanced controls has been the lack of data on which ports are the world’s largest or busiest. There is no global ranking of major fishing ports of any kind, so the goal of this work was to identify, rank and characterize the world’s ports for the purpose of assessing what the impact the PSMA could have at the country level. This list of the top 100 ports by landed tonnage is one of the first of its kind to be published as a single consolidated dataset, and it is intended as a starting point in the further assessment of activity in the world’s fishing ports
Economic Valuation of Marine and Coastal Ecosystems: Is it currently fit for purpose?
Get PDFIn this paper, we consider whether the current “state of the art” of environmental valuation is suitable for producing policy-relevant estimates of the benefits or costs of changes in marine and coastal ecosystems. We review recent changes in European legislation which has meant an increasing demand for economic valuation from the policy and regulatory community. The next section considers, at a more conceptual level, whether the economic “toolbox” and scientific evidence is up to the task of meeting the demand for more evidence-based policy. Finally, three case studies are used to explore the nature of the valuation task and review what is currently known. These case studies are of salt-marsh restoration, marine renewable energy investments, and deep sea conservation
Artificial Reef Attributes and The Relationship With Natural Reefs: Evidence From The Florida Keys
Get PDFNatural or coral reefs represent extremely valuable ecosystems supporting an estimated 25 percent of all marine life, yet recent reports suggest that 75 percent of the world’s natural reefs are under threat from both natural and human stressors. In areas such as the Florida Keys that boasts an expansive mix of natural and artificial reefs, recreational diving on the system provides an important economic contribution to the local community but also potentially contributes to the stress of the existing natural reef system. We develop a revealed and stated preference modeling framework of diver behavior and find that deployment of an additional large ship reef increases overall diving activity but does not impact diving behavior on the natural reef system