MODELLING THE TECHNOLOGY OF COMMERCIAL FISHING VESSEL IN ITALY: A COST FUNCTION APPROACH

The Italian fleet is characterized by a low geographical concentrations and by strong differences in specialization, productivity and profitability between maritime regions and fleet segments. In this paper we try to test the differences in technology and in the level of economy of scale existing among the Italian fleet segments on the basis of the estimation of a translog Cost function (among others Pascoe, 2007; Eggert and Tveteras, 2007). It permits to measure the elasticity of substitution among factors, to assess if it is constant or not and also to estimate the level of economies of scale. The model was applied on a dataset of around 900 vessels; these vessels are part of the sample used within the Italian National Program under the Data Collection Framework to estimate the economic variables of the Italian fishing fleets. The sampling is of a stratified nature in that the fishing vessels of the fleet are divided into homogenous groups (fleet segment and maritime regions) Independent samples are taken from each of these clusters through a Probability Proportional to Size (PPS). The estimate of the value of capital invested in the sector derives from the application of the PIM methodology (Perpetual Inventory Method). The model was applied to the following two segments: trawlers and artisanal vessels. The results of the study mainly attest the existence of economy of scale in both 2 fleet segments. Language: en