First of its Kind Study Estimates Economic Impact of Diving Sector in Mexico

LA JOLLA— In a first-of-its-kind study, a team of researchers have found the diving sector in Mexico generates gross revenues of approximately $725.16 million annually, an economic impact on par with the fishing industry.

The results of the research were published in a paper in the April 2021 edition of Marine Policy.

“Despite the number and popularity of diving destinations in Mexico, no study has previously estimated the economic importance of this industry for the Mexican case,” wrote the authors in the paper.

The team used Google searches to pull information about dive sites and dive shops, using verified results from tourism and diving operators’ websites, websites for diving-related magazines, peer-reviewed scientific publications, and gray literature in their study.

They then traveled all around Mexico conducting surveys, gathering data on revenues, operation costs, how many customers operators have every week and the prices they charge. They then calculated estimated diving operators’ revenues per region based on the number of diving operators, the average number of clients per year, and the average price of one trip.

The resulting outcome was a database of 264 diving operators and 860 diving sites, of which 51.51 percent were found to be located inside protected natural areas, 6.74 percent within a no-take zone, and 41.74 percent outside of protected areas.

Octavio Aburto-Oropeza, the senior author of the paper and associate professor in the Marine Biology Research Division at Scripps Institute of Oceanography in La Jolla, said one of the big findings of the paper is that the diving industry has a similar economic impact as the fishing industry, another major industry that relies on the ocean. The paper cited findings that gross revenues of the Mexican artisanal and industrial fisheries were $700 million in 2019 (Martinez Estrada et al).

Aburto-Oropeza said he hopes this research starts new conversations about how to strike more of a balance between extraction activities, such as fishing, and non-extraction activities, such as diving.

“We are generating a lot of money without extracting all these resources and in the case of diving, a fish or a shark can be seen or can used multiple times, infinitive times compared to other sectors like fishing,” said Aburto-Oropeza.

He said unlike other industries, the diving sector has largely not organized together to influence public policy. According to the study, there is also no public policy that encourages diving activities – aid in starting the business, tax cuts, bonuses for environmentally friendly activities, ect. – or stimulates them to be sustainable and aid in the protection of the marine environment.

“In the big scale they don’t have a strong political voice and that is because they are not organized as an economic sector,” said Aburto-Oropeza.

Aburto-Oropeza emphasized he didn’t believe it should be fishing versus diving, but that there should be conversations about other economical benefits of the ocean and ways the sectors could work together on a collaborative vision that results in higher earnings for both while reducing pressure on marine biodiversity.

The study found the small-scale diving business model, which makes up 90.65 percent of Mexico’s diving industry, if sustainably managed and regulated, represents an opportunity to spread ecotourism across coastal ecosystems in Mexico and, coupled with a focus on scuba diving, generates more net revenues for the operators. In contrast, in general, large-scale tourism causes cascading ecological problems and leads to overuse, and degradation, of natural ecosystems, which can result in a lower ecotourism potential over time, according to the study. The study found the diving industry generates gross revenues of $455.94 million annually when the large-scale businesses are excluded.

“Especially because their assets for their businesses are the reefs that they use to bring all this tourism and if these reefs or if these marine populations are impacted or in a very bad shape the hypothesis is that that business or the revenues of that business will decrease,” said Aburto-Oropeza.

Aburto-Oropeza said he hopes this study will encourage more divers and diving shops owners to get involved in public policy that aids in the protection of these reefs and ocean.

“Scientists working with society to solve problems, especially problems about sustainability and sustainable development goals, this study intends to be part of this proactiveness or this pro-action that scientists also need to do to solve this problem,” said Aburto-Oropeza.

Aburto-Oropeza said they are continuing this work, conducting a new study about ways to protect these diving sites and to establish collaboration with other sectors including the fishing sector.

Co-authors of the study were Ramiro Arcos-Aguilar, Fabio Favoretto, and Victoria Jiménez-Esquivel of Centro para biodiversidad Marina y la Conservación, Joy Kumagai of Scripps Oceanography, and Adán Martinez-Cruz of the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences. The Oceans 5 Foundation, the Wyss Foundation, USA, and the National Geographic Society supported the research.