Study On Distant Water Fishery Production Networks From Different Spatial Scales

Economic globalization causes an ever closer regional links and connections in different spatial scales, and it is very common for specialized division and outsourcing of production. Global production network theory, focusing on cross-border production linkages, has been paid more and more attentions by scholars home and abroad.Exogenous forces of globalization and endogenous factors of seeking development of one nation have caused more and more countries and regions incorporated into global production systems. Using the advantage of labor cost and natural resource, many developing countries accept low-technology and low value added production of developed countries by attracting foreign investment. Thus, developing and developed countries embedded in global production networks, and regional comparative advantage has been more fully exploited, resulting in a good economic returns.Taking distant water fishery as research aim, the thesis analyzes the key elements of distant water fishery and industry characteristics using tuna as an example. The author believes that the development of distant water fishery, effected by natural resources, economic strength, advanced technology, human resources, food culture and consumer preference, etc. has the characteristics of high industrial concentration, strong asset specificity, significant government role and multi-level governance, etc.Using theoretical literature analysis, field research and interviews, network and spatial analysis methods, based on global production network theory, the author discussed the spatial shape, organization structure, network governance and other issues from the global, national and local spatial level, and made the following conclusion.Firstly, the distant water fishery production network is essentially a multi-spatial scale, multi-actor participation and multi-level global production networks, and its formation and development influenced by the profound impact of space and time. Because of the different resource endowments all over the world, the spatial disparity of distant water fishery development is very obvious. Distant water fisheries have different characteristics in different spatial level. In addition, the structure of global production network includes regional fisheries organizations, enterprises, government, industrial associations, universities and research institutions and NGOs, which made different influence to distant water fisheries production network in different spatial scale.Secondly, national government is the main factor effecting spatial governance and power relationship of global production network of distant water fisheries. National economy, political power and foreign have played a vital role in production networks position of different spatial scale.Thirdly, the distant water tuna industry has the characteristics of spatial concentration and professional division of labor. The production and consumption of tuna are mainly in Japan, the United States and European Union countries, the mainly processing sectors centralize in Africa, the Caribbean and Southeast Asian countries. As for the pursuit of the economies of scale, industrial space concentration is increasing mainly, mergers and acquisitions activities are crossing countries and regions, forming production, trade and consumption base which a few big transnational corporations occupy the key position and many small supported manufacturers are surroundings.Fourthly, the technological differentiation of distant water tuna global production network is severe, and the outsourcing in production process is more obvious than that of fishing process. The more and more outsourcing of primary processing sectors are happening from the developed countries to the developing countries, but the developed countries control those high technological content and high added value so that they can still remain in the central position in the GPNs. Fifthly, influenced by resources, market and production capacity, the spatial distribution of distant water fishery has an obvious feature of 'core-periphery'. On the global scale, Japan, the United States and the European Union countries occupy the center position in GPNs as the three biggest core markets, PICs and Indian Ocean countries have been resources center, Japan, Taiwan of PRC, South Korea, and the United States as the center of the production. At the regional scale, Asia-Pacific region has formed the fishing center, Japan is as the core, the Taiwan of PRC and South Korea as sub-centers-China and other developing countries as the third level.At the national scale, Shanghai is as the center, Guangdong, Zhejiang and Shandong as the second core, the spatial structure of "core-periphery" is clear at different scales.At last, there is a significant feature of spatial governance of distant water fishery production. In global level, international conventions, fisheries agreements, legal and management practice are the important factors of the development of global production network of distant water fisheries; in regional level, regional fishery administration organizations, which provides fishery management in regional and sub-regional level with consultant suggestions using the standards, laws, policy and procedures acknowledged by international organization, is the channel between global and national scale; in national level, central government takes the direct responsibility for national fishery resource management.