Fishing‐gear restrictions and biomass gains for coral reef fishes in marine protected areas

Considerable empirical evidence supports recovery of reef fish populations with fishery closures. In countries where full exclusion of people from fishing may be perceived as inequitable, fishing‐gear restrictions on nonselective and destructive gears may offer socially relevant management alternatives to build recovery of fish biomass. Even so, few researchers have statistically compared the responses of tropical reef fisheries to alternative management strategies. We tested for the effects of fishery closures and fishing gear restrictions on tropical reef fish biomass at the community and family level. We conducted 1,396 underwater surveys at 617 unique sites across a spatial hierarchy within 22 global marine ecoregions that represented 5 realms. We compared total biomass across local fish assemblages and among 20 families of reef fishes inside marine protected areas (MPAs) with different fishing restrictions: no‐take, hook‐and‐line fishing only, several fishing gears allowed, and sites open to all fishing gears. We included a further category representing remote sites, where fishing pressure is low. As expected, full fishery closures, (i.e., no‐take zones) most benefited community‐ and family‐level fish biomass in comparison with restrictions on fishing gears and openly fished sites. Although biomass responses to fishery closures were highly variable across families, some fishery targets (e.g., Carcharhinidae and Lutjanidae) responded positively to multiple restrictions on fishing gears (i.e., where gears other than hook and line were not permitted). Remoteness also positively affected the response of community‐level fish biomass and many fish families. Our findings provide strong support for the role of fishing restrictions in building recovery of fish biomass and indicate important interactions among fishing‐gear types that affect biomass of a diverse set of reef fish families.     

Towards a smallholder hydrology for equitable and sustainable water management

Situations of water scarcity challenge sustainability and threaten small users' access to water. In response to this problem, there has been a search for a method of hydrological analysis that can better represent the needs of small water users. While this search is rooted in the debate favouring a more participatory and inclusive allocation of the resource, it also requires a new focus on smallholder hydrology that can confront the gaps and biases found in current hydrological practices in many countries. This article looks at past hydrological practices and also at results of recent studies, highlighting the perspective of smallholder irrigators in surface water planning in Zimbabwe, and groundwater planning in India. These case studies show that wider social forces, not always best science, drive hydrological practices. However, new frameworks focusing on the water user can emerge for more equitable and sustainable water management.     

Closing the open sea: Development of fishery management in four Icelandic fisheries

The article outlines the development of Iceland's fishery rights and the extension of its territorial waters between the 1950s and the mid‐1970s, whereby Iceland gained exclusive control and use of the marine resources of the waters within 12, later 50, and ultimately 200 nautical miles around the island. The article concentrates on four of Iceland's main fisheries: shrimp, herring, capelin and cod. These four fisheries are discussed separately and in depth, presenting the beginnings and growth of the industry and detailing the development of management practices and the corresponding legislation and regulatory measures. Iceland's initial concern was to gain control over the marine resources surrounding the island, but once this was achieved, the focus of attention shifted to managing first the economic and soon also the ecological aspects of its tremendous resource. Informed mainly by indigenous expertise, Iceland's concern was to limit overfishing, manage its fisheries sustainably both from the economic and ecological points of view, and find the best ways to distribute the revenues from the marine harvest. The article looks at each of the four fisheries to clarify how the individual transferable quota (ITQ) system came into being, how initial quota holdings were allotted, and analyses the circumstances under which the ITQ system became the management tool of choice. For each fishery, the process of regulatory evolution was quite unique. At the same time, there is a common pattern to all the fisheries, which may be summarized as follows. Firstly, serious attempts to reform management practices only got underway when the fishery had collapsed or was close to collapse. Secondly, stakeholders invariably started the process of regulation by limiting access to the fishery. Thirdly, a variety of rules were implemented to allocate rights to participate in the fishery to additional entrants once membership had been closed. Finally, prior to the invention of the ITQ system, prices were used to manage fisheries in Iceland. It may be concluded that the management of fisheries by ITQs may be a historical accident, rather than the end point of a logical evolution.     

Risk attitudes and mitigation among gold miners and others in the Suriname rainforest

This article analyses the question: do attitudes towards risk influence participation in small‐scale gold mining, a hazardous activity that generates uncertain income? This question is examined by measuring and comparing the risk attitudes of gold miners and non‐mining community members in the rainforest of Suriname, South America. The author presents a multivariate model to predict the duration of work in mining areas as a function of risk tolerance, age, education, and household demographics. The results suggest that a greater tolerance to risk increases the duration of a person's mining career. However, attitudes explain only a fraction of the variation in occupational choices. Qualitative data suggest that these choices are primarily shaped by local barriers to human capital development and by national economic volatility. Given their marginal position in society and the multitude of mining risk mitigation strategies, it is questionable whether gold mining exposes Suriname forest peoples to greater risks than other subsistence alternatives. The author argues that sensitivity to local historical and cultural conditions would improve the efficiency of policies aimed at developing a more sustainable mining industry. By zooming in on the daily lives of miners, anthropology can complement macro‐scale analyses and contribute to policy interventions in the small‐scale mining sector.     

Strategies for sustainable development of the small-scale gold and diamond mining industry of Ghana

The small-scale gold and diamonds mining industry is of great importance to Ghana. Since its regularization in 1989 the sector has produced and sold over 1.5 million troy ounces of gold and 8.0 million carats of diamonds. During the same period the sector also provided direct employment to over 100,000 people and improved the socioeconomic life of many individuals and communities. However, these were largely achieved at a cost to the environment in areas where mining is carried out and there is the need to develop the industry in a sustainable manner. This paper looks at the developments in the small-scale gold and diamonds mining industry in Ghana and proposes some strategies on how the concepts of sustainable development could be applied to the industry.     

Archaeological Evidence of Validity of Fish Populations on Unexploited Reefs as Proxy Targets for Modern Populations

Reef‐fish management and conservation is hindered by a lack of information on fish populations prior to large‐scale contemporary human impacts. As a result, relatively pristine sites are often used as conservation baselines for populations near sites affected by humans. This space‐for‐time approach can only be validated by sampling assemblages through time. We used archaeological remains to evaluate whether the remote, uninhabited Northwestern Hawaiian Islands (NWHI) might provide a reasonable proxy for a lightly exploited baseline in the Main Hawaiian Islands (MHI). We used molecular and morphological techniques to describe the taxonomic and size composition of the scarine parrotfish catches present in 2 archaeological assemblages from the MHI, compared metrics of these catches with modern estimates of reproductive parameters to evaluate whether catches represented by the archaeological material were consistent with sustainable fishing, and evaluated overlap between size structures represented by the archaeological material and modern survey data from the MHI and the NWHI to assess whether a space‐for‐time substitution is reasonable. The parrotfish catches represented by archaeological remains were consistent with sustainable fishing because they were dominated by large, mature individuals whose average size remained stable from prehistoric (AD approximately 1400–1700) through historic (AD 1700–1960) periods. The ancient catches were unlike populations in the MHI today. Overlap between the size structure of ancient MHI catches and modern survey data from the NWHI or the MHI was an order of magnitude greater for the NWHI comparison, a result that supports the validity of using the NWHI parrotfish data as a proxy for the MHI before accelerated, heavy human impacts in modern times. Evidencia Arqueológica de la Validez de Poblaciones de Peces en Arrecifes Sin Explotar como Objetivos de Apoderamiento para Poblaciones Actuales     

Simple Model of Dissolved Oxygen Consumption in a Bay within High Organic Loading: An Applied Remediation Tool

San Vicente Bay is a coastal shallow embayment in Central Chile with multiple uses, one of which is receiving wastewater from industrial fisheries, steel mill effluents, and domestic sewage. A simulation model was developed and applied to dissolved oxygen consumption by organic residues released into this embayment. Three compartments were established as function of: depth, circulation and outfall location. The model compartments had different volumes, and their oxygen saturation value was used as baseline. The parameters: (a) BOD₅ of the industrial and urban effluents, (b) oxygen demand by organic sediments, (c) respiration, (d) photosynthesis and (e) re-aeration were included in the model. Iteration results of the model showed severe alterations in Compartment 1, with a decrease of 65% in the oxygen below saturation. Compartment 2 showed a small decline (10%) and compartment 3 did not show apparent changes in oxygen values. Measures recommended for remediation were to decrease the BOD₅ loading by 30% in the affected sector. Iteration of the model for 200 h following recommendations derived from the preceding results produced an increase in saturation of 60% (5 ml O₂ L⁻¹), which suggested an improvement of the environmental conditions.     

Patterns of selectiveness in the Amazonian freshwater fisheries: implications for management

Tropical fisheries, which are considered multi-species, may show selectiveness. We analyzed the degree of selectivity of fish catches in 46 sites along the Amazon basin through the percentage of biomass corresponding to the most caught fish species. Amazonian fisheries were considered moderately selective, as 54% of the sites directed more than a quarter of fishing effort to one fish species and in 87% of the sites more than half the fishing effort was directed to five fish species. Commercial fisheries were more selective than subsistence fisheries. Eleven fish species (nine of them migratory) have received more fishing pressure in the studied Amazonian regions and the catch composition differed among regions. We thus recommend that fisheries management in the Amazon basin should distribute fishing effort among more fish species; incorporate the particularities of commercial and subsistence fisheries; evaluate fishing effects on ecosystem services; and consider the biological characteristics of preferred fish.     

Towards deliberative and pragmatic co-management: a comparison between inshore fisheries authorities in England and Scotland

In seeking to answer the question ‘who should be included in fisheries co-management?’, a constructive critique of the existing co-management literature is provided by filling the gaps of Habermas’s deliberative theory of democracy with Dewey’s pragmatism. Three conditions for ensuring democratic co-management are extrapolated from the theories: actors’ authority over decision making (empowerment), actors’ diversity (membership), and the right to self-nomination (procedures for external inclusion). The theoretical insights developed are supported with two examples of co-management institutions for inshore fisheries in the UK: Scottish Inshore Fisheries Groups (IFGs) and English Inshore Fisheries Conservation Authorities (IFCAs).     

How Resilient Are Europe’s Inshore Fishing Communities to Change? Differences Between the North and the South

One would hypothesize that the Common Fisheries Policy, as the umbrella framework for fisheries management in the EU would have the greatest impact on fishers’ communities across Europe. There are, however, biological, economic, social, and political factors, which vary among fishing communities that can affect how these communities react to changes. This paper explores the links between institutional arrangements and ecological dynamics in two European inshore fisheries socio-ecological systems, using a resilience framework. The Mediterranean small-scale fishers do not seem to have been particularly affected by the Common Fisheries Policy regulations but appear affected by competition with the politically strong recreational fishers and the invasion of the rabbit fish population. The inshore fishers along the East coast of Scotland believe that their interests are not as sufficiently protected as the interests of their offshore counterpart. Decisions and initiatives at global, EU, and sometimes national level, tend to take into account those fisheries sectors which have a national economic importance. A socio-ecological analysis can shift the focus from biological and economic aspects to more sustainable long-term delivery of environmental benefits linked to human wellbeing.