Oxygen Depletion and Associated Benthic Mortalities 

 in New York Bight, 1976 



Chapter 14. Socioeconomic Impacts 



William Figley, Bruce Pyle, and Bruce Halgren' 



' Division of Fish, Game, and Shelirisheries, State of 

 New Jersey, P.O. Box 1809, Trenton, NJ 08625 



INTRODUCTION 



New Jersey's marine fishery resources provide substan- 

 tial food and recreation and are a valuable asset to the 

 State's economy. In 1975, New Jersey had 3,056 resident 

 commercial fishermen; 4,677 workers marketed and proc- 

 essed the harvest (National Marine Fisheries Service 

 1976). The dockside value of the 1975 commercial catch 

 was $18 million (NMFS 1977), and the economy generated 

 in processing and marketing was estimated at $46 million 

 for a total commercial value of nearly $64 million. 



During 1974, an estimated 1.46 million residents and 

 1.25 million nonresidents fished and crabbed for recrea- 

 tion in New Jersey's saltwaters (NMFS 1975). Over 32 

 million man-days of activity were spent in pursuit of sport 

 fishing. The 1975 National Survey of Hunting, Fishing, 

 and Wildlife-Associated Recreation estimated that New 

 Jersey marine recreational fishermen spend $19.(12 per 

 trip on bait, tackle, equipment, food and lodging, trans- 

 portation, and related items. Their approximate annual 

 expenditure is over $600 million, if the estimated per-trip 

 expenditure of each person engaged in marine recreational 

 fishing and crabbing within the State is multiplied by the 

 number of days. The absence of expenditures for other 

 marine biota-related recreational activities (e.g., clam- 

 ming) makes this estimate conservative. Undoubtedly, a 

 portion of the expenditures by nonresidents accrue to 

 neighboring States, so that estimated expenditures within 

 New Jersey are considered to be about $500 million an- 

 nually. 



Thus, a conservative estimate of the total economy gen- 

 erated within the State by commercial and recreational 

 marine fisheries in 1975 is $564 million. Most of these 

 revenues were received by commercial fishermen, fish 

 dealers and processors, bait shops, marinas, charter and 

 party boats, restaurants, motels, and gas stations within 

 five southern coastal counties, Monmouth, Ocean, Atlan- 

 tic, Cape May, and Cumberland. The 1976 estimate of 

 personal income for these five counties was $7.7 billion, 

 and that for the State was $54 billion (Shirley Goetz, New 



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