Commercial Sizes and Prices on the French Monkfish Fishery :A Time-Series Analysis

The total value of the Monkfish (Lophius piscatorius and L. budegassa) production seemedgreatly influenced by inter-annual price fluctuations, which could be explained by the evolutionof marketing conditions for fish In certain cases, a local market for fish can be defined so thatthe fishermen are price-makers. In the general case however, producers are subject to externalconditions to their local market. This paper addresses the formation of ex-vessel prices for asingle commercial species, Monkfish (Lophius piscatorius and L. budegassa), proposing anidentification of market integration for the Monkfish species, considering two majorcommercial sizes and different types of fishing units. A time series analysis is conducted from1994 to 2005 on a monthly basis for fishing units exploiting the groundfish communities of theBay of Biscay and the Celtic Sea. Results show that: (i) price series are globally cointegratedboth from the size of species and the size of production units; (ii) the LOP hold for thecommercial size 3 and trawlers over 16 meters.