Managing Small-Scale Fisheries: Alternative Directions and Methods

321 Pages·2001·21.74 MB·English

by  F. Berkes

Managing Small-scale Fisheries
Alternative Directions and Methods
Fikret Berkes, Robin Mahon, Patrick McConney,
Richard Pollnac, and Robert Pomeroy
INTERNATIONAL DEVELOPMENT RESEARCH CENTRE
Ottawa Cairo Dakar Johannesburg Montevideo Nairobi New Delhi Singapore
Published by the International Development Research Centre
PO Box 8500, Ottawa, ON, Canada K1G 3H9
© International Development Research Centre 2001
Legal deposit: 2nd quarter 2001
National Library of Canada
ISBN 0-88936-943-7
The views expressed are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily
represent those of the International Development Research Centre. Mention
of a proprietary name does not constitute endorsement of the product and
is given only for information. A microfiche edition is available.
The catalogue of IDRC Books and this publication may be consulted online
at http://www.idrc.ca/booktique.
Contents
FOREWORD— Brian Davy vii
PREFACE ix
CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION 1
1.1 Not just another fisheries book 1
1.2 A personal perspective 1
1.3 Scope of the book 5
1.4 Types of fisheries 6
1.5 Review of fisheries management from a "people" perspective 11
1.6 What comes next 17
CHAPTER 2: KEY CONCEPTS IN FISHERIES MANAGEMENT 19
2.1 Introduction 19
2.2 Ecosystem-based fishery management 20
2.3 Uncertainty and risk 23
2.4 Protected areas 25
2.5 Adaptive management 26
2.6 Management in information-deficient situations 28
2.7 Governance regimes 31
2.8 Stakeholder participation 33
2.9 Comanagement and empowerment 34
2.10 Conclusion 36
CHAPTER 3: FISHERY MANAGEMENT PLANNING
AND OBJECTIVES 39
3.1 Introduction 39
3.2 An approach to management 39
3.3 Management planning process 42
3.4 The management plan — what should it include? 52
3.5 The fishery management unit 56
3.6 Fishery management objectives .58
3.7 Transparency: documentation, communication, and participation 66
3.8 Conclusion 74
Contents Hi
CHAPTER 4: FISHERY INFORMATION 75
4.1 Introduction 75
4.2 Data and information collection 75
4.3 Traditional ecological knowledge 79
4.4 Literature acquisition and the Internet 85
4.5 Analysis and interpretation 91
4.6 Information management 92
4.7 Communication and use of information .94
4.8 Conclusions 99
CHAPTER 5: PROJECT ASSESSMENT AND EVALUATION
101
5.1 Introduction . 101
5.2 The information stairway 102
5.3 Information categories .107
5.4 Preliminary assessment, baseline, monitoring, and evaluation methods . .113
5.5 Conclusions 128
CHAPTER 6: FISHERY MANAGEMENT PROCESS 129
6.1 Introduction 129
6.2 Management process 129
6.3 Management measures 147
6.4 Enforcement and compliance . 162
6.5 Conclusions 166
CHAPTER 7: MANAGING THE COMMONS 167
7.1 Introduction 167
7.2 "Tragedy of the commons" and its solutions 167
7.3 Who makes the rules to solve the commons dilemma? 173
7.4 Beyond regulation: managing fishing communities 182
7.5 Institutions and capacity building 186
7.6 Conclusions 191
CHAPTER 8: COMANAGEMENT AND COMMUNITY-BASED
MANAGEMENT .193
8.1 Introduction .193
8.2 Conservation project of San Salvador Island, Philippines 193
8.3 Why comanagement? 196
8.4 What is fisheries comanagement? 201
8.5 Conditions affecting the success of fisheries comanagement .212
8.6 A process for community-centred fisheries comanagement 215
8.7 Conclusions .222
iv Contents
CHAPTER 9: NEW DIRECTIONS: A VISION FOR SMALL-SCALE
FISHERIES 223
9.1 Small-scale fisheries in context 223
9.2 New directions: a vision for small-scale fisheries .226
9.3 New directions: concepts, methods, and tools 227
9.4 New directions: how you get there 228
APPENDIX 229
1.1 Questions for ultimate impact variables 229
1.2 Questions for intermediate impact variables 232
1.3 Questions for supra-community level context variables 234
1.4 Questions for community-level context variables 236
1.5 Questions for individual and household-level context variables 249
GLOSSARY 255
ABOUT THE AUTHORS 261
REFERENCES 263
INDEX 285
Contents V
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Foreword
Human dependence on marine and coastal resources is increasing. Today, small-scale
fisheries employ 50 of the world's 51 million fishers, practically all of whom are from
developing countries. And together, they produce more than half of the world's annual
marine fish catch of 98 million tonnes, supplying most of the fish consumed in the
developing world.
At the same time, increased fishery overexploitation and habitat degradation are
threatening the Earth's coastal and marine resources. Most small-scale fisheries have
not been well managed, if they have been managed at all. Existing approaches have
failed to constrain fishing capacity or to manage conflict. They have not kept pace
with technology or with the driving forces of economics, population growth, demand
for food, and poverty. Worldwide, the management and governance of small-scale
fisheries is in urgent need of reform.
One of the reasons for this neglect is that fisheiy science has largely been devoted
to stock assessment, with a geographical focus on countries of the North and a disci-
plinary focus on biology and, to some extent, economics. As would be expected, such
research has not served the fishery-management needs of the South, including countries
that primarily depend on small stocks. Also, it has addressed neither the socioeconomic
needs of fishing populations nor the potential benefits of more collaborative forms of
governance.
In response, Canada's International Development Research Centre (IDRC) has
funded research on the theory and practice of small-scale fisheries management in
the developing world. Practically as one, this research has shown that to improve the
state of fisheries (and, indeed, of most natural resources), managers need to exert
more control over access. It has pioneered an interdisciplinary natural and social
science of fishery management for the South, including approaches that are driven
by management objectives, versions of local framework analysis, and survey method-
ologies in the mould of participatory rural appraisal. Recommendations have included
new governance regimes, such as community-based management or comanagement,
and increased use of local fishery knowledge.
This book presents alternative concepts, tools, methods, and conservation strate-
gies, many of which were developed with IDRC support. It shows how to use these
methods in a practical way and places a strong emphasis on ecosystem management
and participatory decision-making. Natural resource managers, particularly of fisheries
and aquatic resources, in developing countries, will find this book very useful, as will
managers in other sectors because of the increasing spillover of management
approaches across resource sectors. This book will also be of use to representatives
from all government agencies, development institutions, nongovernmental organizations,
international executing agencies, and donor agencies that are involved in fisheries
management, particularly for the small-scale sector.
Foreword vii
IDRC's hope is that this book will, in its own way, assist developing-country
fisherfolk in their pursuit of a sustainable livelihood. We also hope that it presents
a convincing case for a more people-centred model of natural resource management.
Brian Davy
Team Leader, Biodiversity
International Development Research Centre
viii Foreword
Preface
Each of the five of us has been working on various aspects of small-scale fisheries
over the years. But the story of this particular book really started in 1997 with Robin's
paper in the Canadian Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences. In it, Robin pointed
out that the conventional approaches to fishery management had been inappropriate
for small states and small stocks, and identified the need for a different kind of fishery
science better suited to small-scale fisheries management. Fikret and Robin sat under
a tropical tree to explore the need for a book-length treatment of the subject, but first, a
team had to be assembled and some funding found.
The second step came in May 1998 at the conference of the International
Association for the Study of Common Property (IASCP) in Vancouver. The IASCP
conference provided the setting for Bob, Patrick and Fikret to get together with IDRC's
Brian Davy to discuss the idea. The IDRC came up with funding for an initial meet-
ing to develop the book proposal. In January 1999, Richard joined the group and the
whole team met for the first time.
At its January 1999 meeting, the group quickly agreed on the basics. Most
of the world's fishery science effort had been devoted to stock assessment, with
geographic focus on countries of the North and disciplinary focus on biology and,
to some extent, economics. Such fishery science had not served well the fishery
management needs of the South, including countries that primarily depended on
small stocks. As well, it had not adequately addressed the socioeconomic needs
of fisherfolk, nor the potential benefits of participatory management. However, a
number of promising approaches had recently been developed and were now
available for fishery managers to use.
These included methodological approaches that emphasized management
objectives and processes rather than just stock assessment. They included ways
of accessing fishers' knowledge to enrich the information available for management,
means to build capacity and institutions, and collaborative approaches to include
resource users in the management process. The proposed book would be a guide
to these alternative management approaches, providing a vision of an ecologically,
socially, and economically sustainable small-scale fishery in which management
was participatory and the people who did the fishing were no longer politically and
economically marginalized.
IDRC accepted the proposal, and work on the book soon began. The authors
drafted chapters during the summer and fall of 1999, and met to discuss them in
Kingston, Rhode Island, in December 1999. At this meeting, we realized that we
were not discussing merely small states and small stocks. These fishery management
alternatives were as relevant to the North as to the South, and to medium-scale fish-
eries as well as to the small. Our focus remained, however, on small-scale fisheries.
The Kingston meeting was followed by joint writing sessions involving three of the
team members in March 2000 in Barbados. By this time, the original plan that each
team member would write one section of the book had been abandoned in favour of a
series of chapters, to be written collaboratively, with each member taking the lead for
Preface ix