Effects of market constraints, the remuneration system, and resource dynamics on the spatial distribution of fishing effort

This paper is an attempt to identify the decision criteria that lead the fishermen of the French Guyana shrimp fishery to adopt given fishing behaviours. These decision criteria and the subsequent fishing behaviours are then connected to the space-time dynamics of the fleet. The spatial distribution of fleet effort is analyzed at both intra- and inter-annual time scales and compared with the space-time distribution of the resource biomass. It appears that the seasonal movement of the fleet did not follow the oscillations of the resource biomass. This absence of a relationship is explained through analysis of the remuneration system of the fishery. This remuneration contract provides incentives to fishermen to search preferentially for large shrimp during periods of high resource levels and to reorientate their efforts toward smaller shrimp during months of lower catch levels. Furthermore, the fleet exhibits an interannual drift from offshore to inshore fishing zones. A series of tests suggests that this interannual shift might not be a response to long-term resource migration but rather to changes in the market's constraints. However, this lon,a-term shift does not seem to alter the seasonal movement of the fleet.