Good practice:

Wild Salmon grow the economy. Growing a natural resource creates growth in the regional economy.

The numbers of wild salmon in rivers in Northern Sweden have been for many decades seriously depressed due to overfishing, pollution and physical barriers to migration and spawning such as hydro dams in rivers. Changes in fisheries management techniques, better water quality and river restoration has led to a general improvement in the numbers of spawning salmon returning to our region. The numbers of fish returning are now controlled yearly by the installation of several fish counters in our region’s rivers.
The increase in the numbers of fish returning to our rivers has made our region more attractive as a destination for salmon anglers and therefore we believe that the numbers of this category of visitor is and will continue to grow in the future. The increase in visiting anglers leads to a stronger local economy due to general spending by this group of visitors and also an increase in the number of fisheries licenses sold within our region.
The increase in numbers of sold fisheries licenses means that money from this income can be distributed to the local indigenous reindeer herding co-operatives and also increase funds available for management of the fisheries resource.
We prove that growing a natural resource means it can both grow a regional economy and also strengthen its own management economically.

Several fish counters monitor the resource including acoustic counters from 38 000 €, data from fishing licenses sold is free and a previous pilot study of the economic value that sportfishermen bring to the region was utilized. Human resources utilised equate to approx. 60 days per annum.

The practice gives a potential economic value of a natural resource (wild salmon). Increased or decreased numbers of fish and sales of fisheries licenses to a region can be evaluated and the economic benefits through increased spending may be assessed. Evidence accrues over a longer time scale and this data provides a strong tool for people working in fisheries conservation and may help decision makers when choosing investment in restoration of rivers and better management of fisheries.

Difficulties have included transfer of large data from counters placed in isolated areas without suitable internet network coverage. If coverage can be found, then data can be downloaded, and technical problems often solved without the need for regular physical visits to isolated sites.

Regions that have a natural resource either aquatic of terrestrial that is challenged in some way and has a known interest to visitors, but no economic quantifiable value may be interested in our theme. We have for many years had pieces to the puzzle but have not actively tried to place them together into a clear picture and we believe many regions have the same difficulties in quantifying a nature resources value but are already collecting pieces of information that may solve this problem.
Key to applying our technique is:
1. Ability to monitor the size of the resource, we achieved this by finding a suitable technique for fish counting.
2. Having a measure of visitors who are specifically interested in the nature resource in question e.g. Fishing license sales for salmon fisherman
3. A study on the average value each of the above visitors bring to a region.
The above three measures must be utilised for a successful transfer of learning to be achieved.