Governing offshore fish aggregating devices in the Eastern Caribbean: Exploring trade-offs using a qualitative network m
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RESEARCH ARTICLE
Governing offshore fish aggregating devices in the Eastern Caribbean: Exploring trade-offs using a qualitative network model Jeremy Pittman , Jamie C. Tam, Graham Epstein, Cheryl Chan, Derek Armitage
Received: 17 April 2019 / Revised: 26 November 2019 / Accepted: 21 February 2020
Abstract The use of moored Fish Aggregating Devices (FADs) in small-scale fisheries is a potential solution to food security concerns, economic development needs, and the overexploitation of nearshore coastal fisheries in the Eastern Caribbean. However, moored FADs also generate novel and largely unstudied governance challenges involving (1) the provisioning of FADs, (2) fisheries resource appropriation, (3) human wellbeing, and (4) food web impacts. We examine the relative performance of three governance scenarios to address these challenges: private-individual, community-based, and top-down governance. We construct a qualitative network model (QNM) of the fishery based on semi-structured interviews (n = 60) with fishers and fisheries managers, established food web and economic models, and expert knowledge. We simulate the social-ecological impacts of the three governance scenarios. The models suggest that community-based and top-down governance scenarios result in low levels of conflict, but provide limited incentives to develop and maintain moored FADs. The private-individual governance scenario tends to increase conflict and incentives for monitoring FADs, but has no impact on incentives for maintaining and deploying FADs. Keywords Fisheries governance Qualitative network models Small-scale fisheries
Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (https://doi.org/10.1007/s13280-020-01327-7) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.
INTRODUCTION Coastal-marine resources and small-scale fisheries are the backbone of many coastal communities in the Eastern Caribbean. These communities depend on marine resources for livelihoods, food security, and overall wellbeing (Salas et al. 2011). However, marine resources have faced multiple threats from human use (e.g., overfishing) and environmental change (e.g., climate change), and their health status—especially in nearshore areas—has been in decline (Agard et al. 2007). The decline of marine resources has sparked a range of policy responses at the national and international levels (Guarderas et al. 2008; Mathieu et al. 2013; McConney et al. 2016; Scobie 2016). These responses—loosely classified—have included (1) attempts to reduce fishing pressure on nearshore coastal–marine resources through, for example, the establishment of marine protected areas (MPAs) and no-take areas (Guarderas et al. 2008) and (2) promoting exploitation of offshore resources (Mathieu et al. 2013; Sidman et al. 2014; CRFM 2015). The latter typically involves expanding capacities to utilize emerging technologies, such as small-scale, moored fish aggregating devices (FADs) that help reduce the uncertainties and costs associated with offshore fish
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