If your livelihood were slowly disappearing, at what point would you adapt and seek a new profession? Would you see the writing on the wall, or would you insist on milking that job, or crop, or industry for everything it had left? New research sheds some light on how fishermen in varying circumstances make this decision. The results might surprise you.

The study, published in the journal PLoS ONE, surveyed 599 fishermen in 1,732 households in Kenya, Tanzania, the Seychelles, Mauritius, and Madagascar to find out how they would react to declining catch numbers. The question, of course, is not just some hypothetical: fisheries around the world, from Atlantic cod to the giant bluefin tuna, have been fished almost to complete depletion.

The study found that fishermen in poorer countries and situations were more willing to stop fishing and find a new way to survive than those in wealthier countries.

"This is the reverse of the common belief that poor communities are less likely to adapt than wealthy ones," said Joshua Cinner, of James Cook University in Australia, in a press release. "We suspect that this may be in part due to the perverse impacts of subsidies in more developed countries encouraging people to stay in the fishery which would otherwise not be profitable."

Profitability, though, was not the only factor taken into consideration by the fishermen. Tradition, culture, and family often played a role, even in the face of economically obvious choices. "We have found that willingness to adapt to change is influenced by characteristics of the individual fishermen, their households, and most importantly, the local conditions where they live and work," said Tim Daw of the University of East Anglia, the institution that led the study.

Overall, well more than half of the fishermen surveyed would not quit fishing, even in the face of catch numbers dropping by as much as 50 percent. This decision did, however, vary dramatically between locations: only 19 percent of Seychelles fishermen would leave, compared with 60 percent of the fishermen surveyed in Madagascar. The interactions between the reasons to stay or leave were complex and ranged from site-specific factors, like the existing infrastructure for the fishing industry, to household wealth and the availability of other professions.

The study’s take-home point is that it is nearly impossible to pin basic life decisions on one factor. But the fact that so many would be so hesitant to leave a profession that clearly cannot support them indefinitely is illuminating.

Take the bluefun tuna, for instance. To outsiders, Japan's insistent push against catch limits and moratoria is mind-boggling. Some experts say the fishery could be on the verge of catastrophic collapse. Economically speaking, foregoing some income now to avoid zero income later is clearly a good idea. But as the new study shows, the decision is not all about money. The cultural importance of bluefin tuna seems to outweigh the urgent need to let the fishery recover -- to the extent that Japan consistently asserts there is no danger of fishery collapse.

Japan, of course, isn't the only wealthy nation making poor fishing choices. A report from the New Economics Forum released this week found that the European Union loses €3 billion ($3.96 billion) every year due to overfishing.

The study offers other explanations to why fishermen in richer countries tend to stick with their trade. "One of the unexpected findings was that fishermen in a poor country like Madagascar would leave the fishery sooner than those in wealthier countries such as Seychelles," said co-author Tim McClanahan, of the Wildlife Conservation Society. "The reason seems to be that they already have diversified livelihoods, while fishermen in wealthier countries may be locked into this occupation."

Image: Syed Abulhasan Rizvi/Flickr