MANAGING ARTISANAL FISHERIES WITH MARINE FISHERY RESERVES



The rich and diverse resources of the sea are being exploited up
to and beyond sustainable levels in many areas of the world. 
Among the results are extinction of species, disturbance of
delicate ecosystems, collapse of important fisheries, and
destruction of pristine undersea environments.  

Less dramatic, but of enormous importance, is the decrease in
yields, income, and employment from fisheries.

Sometimes the technical expertise and funding necessary to manage
fisheries effectively and protect marine resources is lacking. 
In other cases, the government does not consider the problem a
priority or there is political opposition to regulation.  Systems
of regulation and management developed for modern commercial
fisheries often do not suit the needs of fisheries in developing
countries.  

Partial closure of artisanal fisheries using marine reserves may
be a feasible and effective means of protecting fishery
production as well as habitat and biological diversity. 



Alternative Regulation for Artisanal Fisheries


Artisanal fisheries account for nearly one-third of the food fish
harvested worldwide (see box 1).  In Asia, fishers provide
two-thirds of the total catch, and in Africa they account
for more than 80% of the total (Bailey 1988) (see figure 1).  


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Box 1.

In much of the developing world, the fisheries sector consists of
"artisanal fisheries."  These fisheries are near to shore,
exploited by small-scale fishers using labor-intensive methods
with little or no modern technology.  Typically, they are
part-time, subsistence, and small-scale commercial fishers who
use multiple fishing technologies and target multiple species.  

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Figure 1.

World Fish Production 1990
Total Production: 82,741,000 metric tons

Asia and Oceana 44%
Latin America 17%
Africa 4%
Rest of the World 35%

Source: FAO 1991

Artisanal Fisheries
Production in Asia and Africa

Asia
Artisanal 67%
Nonartisanal 33%

Africa
Artisanal 83%
Nonartisanal 17%

Source: Bailey 1988

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Of the approximately 15 million people directly employed in the
fisheries sector in developing nations, more than 90% are
artisanal fishers.  Support services such as processing,
marketing, boat building, and transportation indirectly employ an
equal number of people.  Despite the importance of artisanal
fisheries in providing food, income, and jobs, governments very
rarely regulate them, and the yields of many have dropped
dramatically.  

As human populations have grown, they have increased pressure on
artisanal fisheries.  Destructive methods, such as dynamite
fishing, have resulted in widespread destruction of fishery
habitats.  In addition, decentralized traditional systems of
fisheries management such as lagoon and sea tenure [note 1],
closed seasons, and closed areas have broken down as the areas
have become more "developed" (Johannes 1978).

[Note 1. In lagoon or sea tenure systems, an individual, family,
clan or other group holds the exclusive rights to fish a specific
geographical area of a lagoon, reef, or coastline.  Transforming
the resource from open access to private property creates an
incentive to manage the resource efficiently.]

Conventional regulatory methods for large-scale commercial
fisheries include licenses, individual or overall harvest quotas,
closed seasons, and restrictions on fishing gear and techniques
(Cunningham 1983).  Artisanal fisheries present several
difficulties for these methods.  

Because the industry is not centralized, it is difficult and
expensive to enforce catch restrictions.  Seasonal closures
present hardships for fishers who rely on the fishery for
subsistence.  Managing fishing effort is very complicated because
fishers often use a variety of fishing methods within the same
fishery.  

By design, conventional fisheries management methods are for
single-species fisheries in which the same group of fishers
target single species.  But artisanal fishers use a wide variety
of fishing technologies and methods and target diverse species. 

Recently, several fisheries biologists (Roberts and Polunin 1991,
Bohnsack 1990, Davis 1989) have suggested that sometimes marine
reserves, which close part of the fishery, may increase overall
fishery harvest.  The reserve acts as a stocking area where
reproduction and growth are not impeded.  

Reserves offer several other advantages including some protection
against collapse of the fishery from overfishing (Bohnsack 1990).
They also require less information about fishers and the
biological state of the fishery than other management methods,
and fishers easily understand reserves.  

Administration and enforcement of a reserve policy only requires
keeping fishers out of the reserve rather than regulating their
activities in all areas.  Marine fishery reserves also protect
species and habitat in their natural state so that researchers
can study them and revenue-generating tourists can enjoy them.

In the past, governments have often viewed fishery regulation and
protected areas as conflicting, even mutually exclusive,
approaches to marine resource management.  Policymakers have
viewed reserves as valuable in conserving habitat and biological
diversity and providing amenities such as diving and snorkeling
sites.  However, decisionmakers have also believed that reserves
impose the cost (besides administrative costs) of the value of 
lost harvest.  

Decisions on whether to establish a reserve require comparison of
these two values.  However, appropriately-designed marine
reserves may allow governments to protect undersea habitat and
biological diversity and simultaneously improve productivity.  If
this is true, conservation and harvest values may actually be
complements rather than substitutes.  

Even so, reserves will not solve the problem of overfishing
outside the reserve unless governments enforce additional laws. 
Although reserves may improve fishery production and security,
they will not achieve economic efficiency by themselves. 
However, when such new regulation is not possible, reserves may
be a second-best management strategy or a valuable component of a
multifaceted management policy.  



Managing Reef Fishery Reserves


Marine reserves will be effective only for certain types of
fisheries.  For instance, reserves may not manage species such as
tuna that live mainly in the open ocean and move from one area to
another.  

Reserves are likely to be more effective for inshore fisheries
such as those based on reefs or mangrove swamps.  In these areas,
fish tend to stay in one location.  A reserve can protect them
from fishers and act as a natural hatchery to replenish stocks in
surrounding areas.

The potential for marine reserves as a fisheries management tool
appears to be greatest for reef fisheries.  If properly managed,
coral reefs could potentially supply 12% of world fish production
and more than 20% of production in developing countries (McManus
1988).  

However, these reef fisheries are difficult to manage with
present methods that limit catch and effort because they are
usually artisanal or recreational fisheries with multiple target
species and fishing methods.  As a result, reefs and nonreef
coral communities within 15 km of shore are generally overfished
(McManus 1988).  

The eggs and larvae of reef fish float in ocean currents for
weeks or even months, spreading them widely (Doherty and Williams
1988).  In this way, the protected population can also replenish
the stocks of surrounding areas (see figure 2).


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Figure 2

The reserve allows an older, larger, and fertile population to
grow.  It then provides recruits to the surrounding fishery by
exporting larvae and adult fish.

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Normally, it is not food or space for adult fish that limit reef
fisheries.  It is the number of new recruits, young fish that
grow to catchable size (Doherty and Williams 1988).  Sufficient
recruitment is especially unlikely with heavily-fished reefs.  A
reserve would not only protect a breeding stock but it would also
allow an older and larger population to develop.  

For many important fish species, larger fish have many, many
times the eggs of smaller fish.  For instance, one 60-cm red
snapper will produce as many eggs as 212 females of 41 cm
(Bohnsack 1990).  Thus, increases in young fish production may
more than compensate for the fishing area given up to the
reserve to protect larger and older fish.



Experience with Marine Reserves


To date, governments have mainly used marine reserves to conserve
marine habitat and biological diversity rather than to promote
fisheries production.  Research on reserves has concentrated on
their ability to protect life and habitat within the reserves
with little investigation of their effects on surrounding areas. 

Roberts and Polunin (1993) undertook extensive studies of marine
fisheries on the Sinai coast of Egypt and the Caribbean. 
Comparing the reserves with surrounding fished areas, they found
significantly higher densities inside reserves for some species
but not for others.  Usually, larger predator species, often
preferred target species, were significantly more abundant and
larger in unfished or lightly-fished areas.  

Two studies of reserves in the United States Florida Keys
demonstrate the effects of banning recreational spear-fishing in
protected areas.  Bohnsack (1982) found higher densities and
larger sizes of several species in the Key Largo National Marine
Sanctuary than on nearby spearfished reefs.  

A survey of Looe Key reef two years after banning spearfishing
showed a 93% increase in snappers and a 439% increase in grunts
(Clark, Causey, and Bohnsack 1989).  They also discovered other
species not present before the ban. 
Evidence shows that reserves will allow a more abundant, larger,
and more fertile population to develop in protected areas on
tropical reefs. 

However, evidence supporting the theory that the reserve
population will supplement the surrounding fishery is much
weaker.  The only clear support comes from research results done
on a small reserve in Central Philippines (Russ 1985, Alcala
1988).  

The government closed a 700-meter-wide section of the 50-hectare
fringe reef surrounding the Sumilon Island to fishing from 1974
to 1983.  The reserve area was approximately 25% of the total
reef area.  The decrease in overall reef fishery yields, after
people began fishing in the reserve area, illustrates the
benefits that the reserve had provided  

Beginning in 1984, political changes withdrew reserve protection,
and fishers began to encroach on the reserve area.  Between 1983
and 1985, the reef density of primary target species fell by 45%
to 95% (Russ 1985).  Catch per unit effort declined by 55% to
33%, depending on the type of gear.  Overall yield for the reef
dropped from 36.9 t/km2/yr in 1983-1984 to 19.87 t/km2/yr by 1986
(Alcala 1988).

Apo Island, near Sumilon, also provides evidence in support of
reserves.  With the support and participation of the local
community, the government began a marine conservation program
including a small reserve and a halt to destructive fishing
methods.  In 1986, estimated production from the Apo reef was
31.8 t/km2/yr (White 1987).  This is far above the 4-6 t/km2/yr
expected from a reef under moderately heavy exploitation (Munro
1984).

Although there is "limited" evidence for the benefits of reserves
to fisheries, there is "no" evidence to the contrary.  Research
clearly shows that reserves are effective in protecting fish
populations within their boundaries.  Theory and the experience
with the Sumilon reserve also suggests that reserves could
effectively maintain or increase yields from reefs surrounding
reserves.  Future studies and experiments [note 2] will help
answer this unexplored potential.   

[Note 2. Large-scale, long-term studies of effects of reserves on
reef fisheries have recently been started by Australia's Great
Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority and in California's Channel
Islands Biosphere Reserve.  Proposals for a fishery reserves
system in the U.S. Virgin Islands also offer chances for
important research (Roberts and Polunin 1993).]



Policy Implications and Research Recommendations


Artisanal fisheries are extremely important to the livelihood and
nutrition of many developing countries.  However, overfishing and
destructive fishing methods often reduce harvest well below its
potential and threaten the resource base itself.  

Traditional systems of managing artisanal fisheries frequently
break down.  And regulatory methods developed for modern
commercial fisheries are often not appropriate for artisanal
fisheries.  Marine reserves may offer a way to both increase
fishery yields and protect the resource base.

Evidence supporting the use of marine reserves for fisheries
management is encouraging but not conclusive.  More experience
and research will provide policymakers with practical information
about the effects of reserves on fishery production and the
appropriate size and location of reserves.  

Research has focused almost exclusively on marine reserves on
tropical reefs.  It now needs to investigate the applicability of
reserve management to other habitats such as mangrove swamps,
estuaries, and even deep-water fisheries.

So far, analysis of marine reserve policy has not properly
studied the economic implications for the fishery [note 3].  The
economic analysis would compare future gains to earlier losses
since the fishery may benefit from the reserve only after an
extended transition period.  

[Note 3. There is a large literature on design, value of, and
experience with marine reserves (see Salm and Clark 1984, Dixon
and Sherman 1990, Tisdell and Broadus 1989).  However, it 
focuses on the benefits of protection of species, habitat, and
tourist sites inside the reserve and sheds little light on their
effect on surrounding fisheries.]

It is also important to explore how establishing a reserve
affects fishing effort and how that effort affects the
performance and the appropriate design of the reserve.  A
comprehensive economic evaluation must consider benefits (or
losses) to the fishery together with nonfishery benefits such as
conservation and amenity values such as sightseeing. 
Policymakers must compare these benefits to the cost of
implementing and managing the reserve.  

The eventual failure of the Sumilon reserve points to another,
equally important policy implication for development of reserves.
The success of the reserve will ultimately depend on its
acceptance by fishers and other coastal residents, particularly
if there are limited resources for enforcement.  Reserve design
and development must include a politically and financially
feasible system of governance, usually requiring local support
(White 1989).  

Fishers must be able to see the long-term benefit of the reserve
to fishery production if production initially drops from area
lost to fishing.  Fishers may also require temporary aid
to sustain them until fishery production recovers.  

Marine reserves are valuable because they protect biological
diversity and habitat and may also increase fishery production. 
Reserves deserve much wider use in areas that are currently
ineffectively managed.  Developing country policymakers
responsible for marine resource management should investigate the
potential of marine reserves and ensure that their design
addresses social, economic, and ecological concerns.