ECONOMICS OF THE FISHERIES 435 



shucking oysters and clams, beheading shrimp, etc. Some of them operate 

 also retail markets for local trade, and a few of them restaurants. 



The services performed by these coastal producer-dealers also include 

 selling, which may be to wholesale commission merchants in the large 

 northern cities, to other inland distributor-dealers, wholesalers, retailers, 

 or, to some extent, to truck pedlars. In many cases the producer-dealers 

 own outright or participate in the ownership of boats, pound nets, and other 

 gear, and through this ownership they share in the profits of the catch in 

 addition to their interest in the catch as merchants after they have received it. 



It is customary in all three areas for the producer-dealers to advance 

 credit to fishermen, usually for the purchase of fishing equipment, but 

 occasionally for other things, such as family groceries and expenses. These 

 transactions take the form of "advances" by the dealers on future catches 

 of the fishermen. Ordinarily there is no formal evidence of indebtedness 

 securing the loan, and usually no interest. In general, the understanding 

 is that the dealer will deduct, with the approval of the fisherman, a reason- 

 able sum from the catch weekly until the debt is discharged, the fishermen 

 agreeing in turn to sell all of his catch exclusively to the lending dealer 

 so long as any part of the loan is outstanding. We have no exact data on 

 the extent of this practice. In the war and immediate post-war years, with 

 prices high and amounts of money unprecedentedly large, we were informed 

 that the amount of this kind of indebtedness was and is at a minimum, 

 probably fewer than lo to 20 per cent of the fishermen being in debt the 

 last two or three years. 



The mode of fixing prices paid by the producer-dealers to the fishermen 

 is a subject which itself deserves extensive research and consideration, but 

 which is beyond the scope of this Survey. We have acquired some informa- 

 tion on this subject, but not sufficient to justify any general conclusions. 

 In the northern area, during the busy season, boat fishermen are informed 

 daily by the dealers the prices which will be paid, and settlement is made 

 weekly on the basis of these daily prices. In the central area it seems to be 

 the practice for all the dealers to settle weekly for about the same prices. 

 How these prices are arrived at is not entirely clear to us, but at any rate 

 it appears that the fishermen themselves do not always know what prices 

 they are to receive until after the fish have been delivered and shipped. We 

 have already commented on this subject in general terms in the section of 

 this report entitled "Economics of the Fisheries — General and Qualitative — 

 Production." 



Difficulties of Marketing Imposed by Geographical and Seasonal Influ- 

 ences. So far as quantity is concerned, the fish produced in North Carolina 

 could be handled more efficiently and at lower unit cost by ten or a dozen 

 dealers; actually 127 dealers were reported in North Carolina in 1946. 



