Territorial use rights for fisheries: A bioeconomic analysis of migratory resources and heterogeneous fleets

Ocean & Coastal Management | May 2026

This paper presents a dynamic bioeconomic simulation model that illustrates the potential impacts of Territorial Use Rights for Fisheries (TURFs), incorporating resource mobility and economic and technological disparities among fleets. The analysis was conceptually inspired by institutional arrangements observed in Colombia's Exclusive Artisanal Fishing Zone (ZEPA), where artisanal and industrial fleets interact over migratory species. No empirical data from ZEPA were used, and the model was designed to be generalizable to other tropical fisheries with similar ecological and institutional characteristics. The model compared Open-Access, Maximum Sustainable Yield (MSY), and Maximum Economic Yield (MEY) benchmarks against TURF scenarios, both with and without self-organization incentives. The results indicated that: i) simply designating a TURF increased biomass by more than 120% relative to open access;
ii) when TURFs incentivized artisanal fleet self-organization, total profits rose from zero to over 3000 monetary units, and biomass increased by over 30%;
iii) larger TURFs considerably enhanced catch-per-unit-effort (CPUE), biomass, and fleet profits, whereas greater resource mobility reduced long-term sustainability; and
iv) although the effect of the migration coefficient was minor, higher mobility generally increased effort and extraction, thereby lowering profits. These findings underscore the importance of territorial management and collective action, offering theoretical insights to support policy design in tropical fisheries with mobile resources and heterogeneous fleets.

04-05-2026