How Do You Manage A Free-For-All?

Fishing. It's one of Hawaii residents most treasured and fiercely protected fundamental rights. But fishing in Hawaii is only partly about sustenance. Given that the local Hawaiian waters are teeming with brilliantly colored tropical fish, many endemic (found nowhere else on the planet), fishing is also about income. The strange thing, though, is that despite all the reef harvesting that's going on for food or the international marine aquarium trade, none of the fishing has ever required a permit nor have there been limits to how many fish any single fisher can take.

But all that may be about to change. On January 23, 2008, Senate Bill 3225 was introduced by Senator Clayton Hee to the Hawaii State Legislature to impose bag limits as well as complete bans on the collection of several species of coral reef fishes commonly exported from the Hawaiian Islands for the aquarium trade. If approved, no more than 20 ornamental fish per day per collector can be removed from Hawaiian waters, with no more than five yellow tangs in the total mix.

I've written here before that a noticeable shift is occurring in coastal Hawaiian waters. From 1955 to 2002, the Hawaii commercial mullet catch dropped 91 percent from 104,000 pounds to 9,210 pounds. Papio and ulua catches dropped by two-thirds during the same period, from 286,488 pounds to 98,734 pounds. 'O'io, prized for fishcakes, dropped from 36,171 to 4,416 pounds, an 88 percent drop.

As far as aquarium fishing goes, things aren't much better. Saltwater aquarium collection is a growing business throughout the state. In the past 20 years, the state's total catch of aquarium fish has quintupled. In 2005, the Hawaiian aquarium fish industry reported grossing more than $3 million in sales (the vast majority of which are shipped from Hawaii to international buyers). Aquarium fish limit legislation proponents argue that the most heavily targeted aquarium fish (tangs, angelfish, butterfly fish, wrasses) are disappearing from Hawaiian reefs and that putting regulations in place is the only way to ensure their survival and that of the fragile reef ecosystem.

Local fish limits supporters call the proposed legislation appropriate and reasonable. Fish limits opposition claims that the proposed legislation would have a detrimental effect on saltwater aquarium owners. Some members of the opposition claim that the legislation is intended to destabilize the Hawaiian aquarium fishery and the livelihoods of associated stakeholders rather than to produce helpful resource management solutions. These objectors see the proposed legislation as somewhat of a blunt object and misdirection, pointing the finger at the aquarium collection trade as chief cause of adverse fluctuations in reef fish populations instead of recognizing other factors and the inherent complexity in coral reef environments.

Both sides have a point, but the difficult question of how to manage a degrading resource which has heretofore been left unmanaged remains unanswered. Is an imperfect system better than no system at all? It will be interesting to see how Hawaii chooses to resolve this Gordian Knot.