The CFRF is pleased to release a report titled “The Economic Impact of Rhode Island's Fisheries and Seafood Sector”, which is the result of a collaboration with Dr. Tom Sproul at the University of Rhode Island. This study is the first to measure the economic impact of the RI Fisheries and Seafood Sector using an approach in which businesses are hand-counted to estimate jobs, gross sales, and economic impacts across the state.
Rhode Island's Fisheries and Seafood Sector includes commercial fishing and shellfishing, fishing charters, processing, professional service firms, retail and wholesale seafood dealers, service and supply firms, and tackle shops. Including spillover effects across all sectors of the Rhode Island economy, the total economic impact of the Rhode Island Fisheries and Seafood Sector was 4,381 jobs and $538.3 million in 2016. To facilitate policy discussion, the study also estimated multipliers for X-Vessel landings values for jobs (32.43 jobs per $million) and economic impact (3.06).
Based upon Tom Sproul's past work, the RI Fisheries and Seafood Sector has a greater economic impact than many of RI's other natural resource sectors, including Agriculture ($240 million), Forestry ($407 million), Composites Manufacturing ($300 million), and Parks and Beaches ($310 million). The CFRF is hopeful that this work will give decision makers the data and impetus to better support Rhode Island’s fishing and seafood community
To learn more, please view or download the full report and technical appendix HERE.
The CFRF is grateful to the Rhode Island Foundation and the Rhode Island Department of Environmental Management for their support of this work.
