There are plenty more (sustainable) fish in the sea: A discrete choice experiment on discarded species in Italy

Abstract

Overfishing is a widespread environmental issue that needs to be resolved to secure sustainable fishing practices over time. An additional and much less-discussed threat to sustainable fishing is represented by discards, that is, the accidentally caught species that are thrown back into the sea given their low market relevance. Fishermen often decide to discard some species mainly depending on their low market value. Therefore, supply-side regulations can only be partially effective in taking care of discarding practices given that they are mainly due to demand-side issues. One possible solution could involve the purchase of discarded species, provided that consumers are willing to change their habitual consumption patterns. In this paper, a discrete choice experiment is conducted to investigate whether consumers would be willing to pay for discarded species. The data are analyzed using a mixed logit model and a latent-class logit model. The results indicate that consumers tend to prefer the most commercialized species, although their interest in discarded species increases when they receive specific information on ecolabels and discarding. Our outcomes also underline that consumers could be divided into specific groups according to their preferences, which could be useful for enhancing discarded species' consumption effectively.