

Annual blue crab commercial landings in the Gulf of Mexico Region. Louisiana is the largest producing state in the Gulf of Mexico, supplying more than 26.4% of all domestically-caught blue crabs, and 81.6% of all the blue crabs harvested in the Gulf of Mexico region.įigure 3. During the last five years, the Gulf States supplied 32.3 % of the entire blue crab domestic landings averaging 52.5 million pounds and valued at $63.7 million annually.

The Gulf States were expected to have collected taxes from households and businesses in 2015 amounting to $4.2 million as social insurance tax, tax on production and imports, corporate profits tax, and personal tax.įigure 3 shows the commercial landings of blue crabs from the Gulf of Mexico Region since 1990. About $8.6 million were estimated to have been paid by households and businesses in 2015 to the federal government as social insurance tax, tax on production and imports, corporate profit tax, and personal income tax. The blue crab commercial fishing industry generates annual tax revenues for the Gulf States and the U.S. The blue crab commercial fishing created 1,995 jobs and generated labor income amounting to $50.5 million in the Gulf regional economy. The total economic contribution of commercial blue crab fishing in 2015 amounted to $141.4 million (Figure 2). The annual commercial dockside values of blue crab in the Gulf of Mexico Region in 2015 reached $74.5 million, which was about 17% more than the average annual dockside values during the last five years. The local purchases percentage was set to 100%. Total economic impact includes direct, indirect and induced effects estimated by using 2015 annual landing values and 2013 IMPLAN data. Induced effects are the product of personal consumption expenditures by industry employees.įigure 2. The direct effects express the economic impacts in the sector in which the expenditure was initially made. Indirect effects result from changes in the economic activity of other industrial sectors which supply goods or services to the commercial fishing industry. The total economic impact is the sum of direct, indirect and induced impacts. Value-added is the contribution made to the value of seafood products at each stage of harvesting, processing, and distribution. Labor income includes personal income including wages and salaries and proprietors’ income or income from self-employment. Employment impacts are expressed in terms of a mix of both full-time and part-time jobs. The income, value-added, and output impacts are expressed in dollars for the year specified by the user. Output or sales are the gross sales by businesses within the economic region affected by an activity. The IMPLAN economic model generates economic impact estimates regarding output or sales, employment or jobs, labor income, value added and tax revenues. The economic impact analysis used sector 17 or commercial fishing of the 2013 IMPLAN input-output data.
BLUE CRAB SEASON FLORIDA SOFTWARE
The IMPLAN ( ) software and the 2013 input-output data for the five Gulf States were used to estimate the economic contribution of blue crab commercial fishing to the Gulf of Mexico regional economy in 2015. This information is crucial in making private investment decisions, formulating government policy, and developing research and extension programs for the industry. Source: Gulf FINFO ( ).Įconomic Contributions of Blue Crab Commercial FishingĮconomic impact analysis shows the economic contribution an industry makes locally, region-wide, nation-wide, or globally.

Adult blue crabs are found on a variety of bottom types including submerged vegetation, unvegetated sediments, and marsh grass in fresh, estuarine, and shallow oceanic waters throughout the Gulf.”įigure 1. As juvenile crabs grow larger, they move to fresher waters. Juveniles remain in the upper and middle estuary in areas with marsh and sea grass, oyster reefs, as well as soft mud bottoms, all of which provide some protection from predators. Post-larvae move into shallow, lower salinity estuarine waters. Blue crab larvae are found in salty offshore waters. There are likely two different blue crab stocks in the Gulf: a Florida or Eastern Gulf stock along the Florida coast (centered around Tampa Bay) and a Western Gulf stock from central Texas to Apalachicola Bay (centered in Louisiana). According to Gulf FINFO ( ), blue crabs (Figure 1) “range from Nova Scotia and Maine to northern Argentina and are found throughout the Gulf.
