Cost-earnings Study and Economic Performance Analysis of American Samoa Longline Pelagic Fishery—2016 Operation and Recent Trends

Economic health and trends of the American Samoa pelagic longline fishery were examined by conducting in-person surveys with longline fishermen to collect fishing cost data and performing cost-earnings analyses on fleet operations in 2016.

While keeping the definition of economic performance measures and the survey approach consistent with previous cost-earnings studies in the fishery, this study tried to improve data quality through linking the cost data with the fishing operation data, and the average costs per set and total number of sets were used to estimate the annual total variable costs.

The findings of the 2016 cost-earnings status were compared with the previous studies done on 2001 and 2009 operations.

Findings revealed improvement in the economic performance of the American Samoa fleet in 2016 over the 2009 operation, but was still poor compared to the 2001 operation. The differences of lower CPUE, lower fuel price, higher fish price, and lower fixed costs resulted in higher cash returns in 2016 operations over 2009.

In addition, this study investigated the increasing demand for American Samoa longline permits from the Hawaii longline permit holders, while the number of active vessels in American Samoa longline declined.

Two main factors contributed to this dual-permits-phenomenon: the poor economic performance of the American Samoa longline fishery and the advantage of continuing access to the Hawaii longline fishery even when the fishery was closed due to the bigeye catch limit for U.S. longline being reached.

Pan M. 2019. Cost-earnings Study and Economic Performance Analysis of American Samoa Longline Pelagic Fishery: 2016 Operation and Recent Trends. U.S. Dept. of Commerce, NOAA Technical Memorandum NOAA-TM-NMFS-PIFSC-85, 35 p. https://doi.org/10.25923/jemx-6804.