California's Ocean Economy - California Resources Agency - State ...

NOEP
The travel economy is generally defined as activity associated with travel away from home.
Travel may be undertaken for many purposes, including business, visiting friends and
relatives, and for recreation. Trips may be single or multi-purpose. Travel to coastal
counties in California may include coastal recreation or use of a coastal facility in whole or
part. To get a sense of the entire travel industry affecting coastal California, we examined
travel and tourism in the state as a whole and in the coastal counties. A portion of the
economic value reported under travel and tourism is ocean related, but we do not know
what that portion is precisely.
Regional Estimates of Economic Impact of California Tourism and Recreation
The NOEP team separated employment, wages, and contribution to GSP for those
establishments located in shore-adjacent zip codes and defined this as ocean-related tourism
and recreation. This is a smaller proportion of total travel activity in coastal counties, but it
includes those activities most likely to be affected by ocean and coastal resources. It also
includes the activities of both those who travel or spend money for recreation and for other
purposes such as business.
The next sections of this chapter present data for each of these aspects of Tourism &
Recreation in coastal California.
8.2 Coastal Recreational Activities
All economic activities relating to coastal recreation are affected by the quality of the
environment. Coastal land, beaches, watersheds, and coastal waters each provide a link
between the travel and tourism industry and coastal recreational industries such as
swimming, surfing, boating and fishing. The level of participation in coastal water/naturerelated
industries affects several other industries and sectors of the economy. Increased
demand for coastal recreation will result in increased demand for the hotel, restaurant, and
service industry. This will also, indirectly, increase the construction activity along the coast
as more hotels and vacation homes are built. For example, an increase in water-skiing will
increase the manufacture and sale of boats used for these activities. Similarly, an
improvement in a beach will lead to more beach visitors leading to increased beach-wear
demand, which will lead to increased manufacturing and retailing business. Increased
demand will also affect infrastructure construction activities. Roads, parking lots, water and
waste water systems and the like will also be necessary. Therefore, it is important to define
and measure the scale and scope of coastal recreational activities along the California coast
before estimating market or non-market values for coastal tourism.
The National Survey of Recreation and Environment (NSRE) in 2000 was the first national
survey that included an assessment of public participation in marine recreation. This survey
defined nineteen activities as part of marine recreation. These nineteen activities can be
divided into four major subgroups: beach activities, recreational fishing, recreational boating,
and other marine recreational activities. Table 8-4 provides the estimates for California 48 for
each of these subgroups. Figure 8-2 depicts the proportion of different marine recreational
activities. The NRSE estimation method captures the number of California residents who
48 Source NSRE 2000.
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