Fisheries labor quality and operational efficiency: Evidence from China

As an influential pillar of the agricultural and rural economy, the fishery plays a critical role in ensuring food supply, promoting fishermen’s income growth, supporting rural revitalization and poverty alleviation, advancing ecological civilization construction, and safeguarding national maritime rights and interests. Taking the microdata of seven listed fishery companies in China as an example, the DEA-BCC model and the Malmquist index are used to calculate their operating efficiency from 2015 to 2024. Based on this, the impact of labor quality on operating efficiency is analyzed using the Tobit model. It was found that the quality of the enterprise’s labor force can promote operational efficiency improvements by increasing the enterprise’s R&D investment. Therefore, fishery enterprises should pay attention to the introduction of high-quality talents and the cultivation of technological innovation talents, and provide strong support for achieving high-quality development.