| Sumario: | The article focuses on optimization and suboptimization in fishery regulation. The article aims to show that fishery regulation is one of those spheres of economic policy where what is the best thing to do depends on what can be done. What follows is a static analysis of a single-trawl fishery where there is only one fish stock, fished from ports, which supply a common market and which are equidistant from the fishing ground. It is assumed that the port market is competitive and that there are no restrictions on entry into the fishery. These assumptions serve to make the exposition reasonably simple. Determinants of the weight of catch, under these assumptions, are twofold, given constant natural population parameters. The first is the rate of capture of the fish liable to capture, which is proportionate to the amount of fishing effort. The second determinant of the weight of catch is the size or age at which the fish become liable to capture, that is, are recruited to the fishery. Biologists have formulated a number of models, which provide a function relating the weight of catch to the two variables, mesh size and fishing effort.
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