Scoping study on the development and sustainable utilisation of inland fisheries in South Africa
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Date
2015
Authors
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Institute for Poverty, Land and Agrarian Studies, University of the Western Cape
Abstract
South Africa’s inland fishery resource endowment has been overlooked as a means of supporting sustainable
livelihoods in the democratic era, lacking a guiding policy and legislation aligned with the country’s rightsbased
Constitution. The absence of an equitable inland fishing governance framework with defined use
rights has resulted in growing unmanaged and unsustainable fishing practices, conflicts between resource
users, and the perpetuation of Colonial- and Apartheid-era exclusion of rural communities from livelihood
and economic opportunities linked to aquatic natural resources. In response to this problem, the Water
Research Commission launched a solicited research project entitled “Baseline And Scoping Study On The
Development And Sustainable Utilisation Of Storage Dams For Inland Fisheries And Their Contribution
To Rural Livelihoods” to provide a knowledge base to inform the development of policy and institutional
arrangements for inland fishery governance.
The project was executed by a trans-disciplinary team of researchers with fisheries and social science
backgrounds from Rhodes University’s Department of Ichthyology and Fisheries Science; the University
of the Western Cape’s Institute for Poverty, Land and Agrarian Studies (PLAAS), and the South African
Institute for Aquatic Biodiversity (SAIAB).
Description
Keywords
Fisheries, South Africa, Livelihoods, Natural resources, Fishing communities
Citation
Britz, PJ. et al. (2015). Scoping study on the development and sustainable utilisation of inland fisheries in South Africa. Report. Institute for Poverty, Land and Agrarian Studies, University of the Western Cape