Cost Recovery (Fisheries)

Cost recovery in fisheries is the policy of charging the industry for the management services it consumes, shifting research, monitoring, and enforcement costs from taxpayers to quota holders. New Zealand’s quota management system and Australia’s Commonwealth fisheries levy management fees on operators in proportion to attributed costs. The rationale is that beneficiaries of a managed common-property resource should fund its stewardship and that priced services discipline both spending and effort. Levies are set against an annual cost-recovery plan and can be challenged where the attributed share exceeds the benefit received.