Valoración del stock de capital. Aplicación a la flota española de arrastre marisquero congelador

Abstract

One of the transcendental elements of the neoclassical theory of capital is the role that physical capital plays as an essential input to understand productive processes. An adequate measurement must consider its nature of stock in a dynamic environment throughout its service life. This doctoral thesis delves into the most relevant aspects for a correct assessment of the capital stock of the Spanish shellfish freezer trawling fleet as well as the investment flows that have established the rate of capital accumulation from its origins to the present day. To do it, it has been essential to obtain the age-price profile of the fleet ships that brings us closer to the analysis of the influence that market has had on prices in the transactions of ships belonging to this kind. In this process depreciation is considered the decisive variable. The annual net investment series in this fleet has been obtained from the estimated values of the capital stock. At the end of the 1950s, the Spanish fishing sector was mainly artisanal and coastal. From the 1960s, fishing exploitation changed due to the introduction of industrial cooling. In 1962 the first freezer ships began to be incorporated in Huelva. This fleet, which was mainly from Huelva, will lead the expansion of the Andalusian fishing fleet until the mid-1970s. A characteristic feature of this fleet is that it worked to catch crustaceans. As this species have high commercial value, it is a segment with high profits in comparison with the rest of the high seas fleets. The vessels in this fleet are large with high technology and carry out their fishing activities in third country waters. The estimation of the capital stock has been made using the methodological approach suggested by international organisations such as the OECD. The most widely used methodology for capital valuation is the Permanent Inventory Method, which estimates the series of capital stock at replacement price considering both investment flows and depreciation flows. The application of this methodology to measure the capital stock of a fishing fleet has involved the estimation of the gross value of the capital stock of a vessel of a certain age from the acquisition value of new and second-hand vessels. To do it, it has been necessary to reconstruct the census of this fleet. In the empirical application, the functional form that determines the ship building value in this fleet has been estimated based on technical characteristics, the shipyard in which it was built and the existence of a transformation process where a non-freezer ship has turned into a freezer one in the ship history. This has allowed us to have the gross value of the ships that carried out the fishing activity. After including for each year the building value of the ships built that year, the gross annual investment flows have been obtained. The market value of a ship has been estimated for each of the boats in this fleet using its useful life, based on the building value, age, engine power and building year. The series which includes the ship values for the years in which it is part of the fleet defines the depreciation profile of a ship. After adding the values of the vessels, the value of the capital stock of this fishery has been obtained for each year. The depreciation rate of each vessel and the annual net investment figures have been estimated. Among the most relevant conclusions, it is worth highlighting that the incorporation of the building value of each ship is not too extensive in the current literature on capital valuation. Therefore, we believe that this is an important contribution. Furthermore, the impact of the progressive incorporation in fishing vessels of technological improvements, the value that the market assigns to the greater fishing power and the gradual process of penalisation that assigns to the most obsolete ships are reflected when estimating the market value of a ship. The valuation of this fleet using the estimated capital stock figures differs to a great extent from that which would be made, erroneously, if we quantify the fleet based on the number of vessels. Finally, geometric depreciation pattern is the most appropriate to represent the loss of value experienced by these ships in line with the proposals of international organisations about capital valuation methodology and relevant authors such as Hulten and Wykoff (1981) or Jorgenson (1989).