Evolutionary policy of trading of blue carbon produced by marine ranching with media participation and government supervision

Abstract Blue carbon produced by marine ranching has tremendous economic and ecological value. A sound blue carbon trading mechanism, a fair market environment, and an effective supervision framework will help to transform and upgrade the marine economy through blue carbon trading. The present study develops a three-party evolutionary game model, that consists of the government supervisory agency, the blue carbon trading platform, and the news media, to analyse the evolutionary equilibrium conditions and each party’s evolutionarily stable strategy. It also performs numerical simulations on the evolution strategies. The study results demonstrate: (1) More strict supervision from the government will prevent the platform from engaging in opportunistic behaviours, and ensure fairness in blue carbon trading. (2) The news media’s participation as a watchdog can play a role in restraining the platform’s non-compliance behaviours, but a free-rider issue may also arise, which leads to an absence of supervision. (3) Consumers’ recognition of marine ranching products and the proportion of blue carbon produced by marine ranching that is available for trading will indirectly affect the platform’s course of action. Lastly, the paper makes policy recommendations for the development of a well-functioning blue carbon trading mechanism, a fair market environment, and an effective supervision framework.