Abstract
In India, fisheries governance suffers from weak regulation and poor compliance, with a primary exception – a collection of coastal seasonal fishing bans or closures. Much other fisheries policy (e.g., fuel subsidies or incentives for deep-sea fishing) promotes increasing production over conservation. The benefits of such measures have generally accrued to owners of industrial and semi-industrial operations, often at the expense of the small-scale fisheries sector. Viewed critically, Indian fisheries governance can be described as out of compliance with the FAO’s new Voluntary Guidelines for Securing Sustainable Small-Scale Fisheries (the SSF Guidelines). In this chapter, we analyze the coastal seasonal fishing bans in light of the SSF Guidelines and, in particular, the provisions for sustainable resource management (Section 5b of the Guidelines). Details of the monsoon bans have varied by time and place, but a diverse group of stakeholders have generally accepted the principle of a seasonal ban. However, there remains a complicated history of policy, legal, and social contestations – in short, politics – around the particulars of the bans, which we review. We also consider the specific case of Karnataka state. We find that weak scientific arguments generate a contested ecological justification and reduced support for seasonal closures. We suggest the monsoon bans are better justified when framed as safeguards for the small-scale fisheries sector. The SSF Guidelines provide a normative foundation for strengthening the monsoon fishing bans as part of dynamic fisheries management to privilege and protect India’s small-scale fisher communities.
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Notes
- 1.
We focus exclusively on marine fishing (and estuarine fishing, in so far as those fishing communities, markets, and governance overlap the marine sector).
- 2.
Larger fishing boats comparable to international fleets are nearly nonexistent in India.
- 3.
The particulars of the marine fishing regulation acts and rules of each individual state are beyond the scope of this chapter; however, we note that they were typically patterned after a central government ‘model’ legislation.
- 4.
This bears resemblance to the international system of national ‘ownership’ of the Exclusive Economic Zone.
- 5.
A fishery management official actually laughed at one of the authors when he once asked if an ITQ could be possible.
- 6.
Though state statistics on catch differ some from CMFRI’s data, we use Karnataka’s figures here because the state counts catch by gear type.
- 7.
Fish catch data in India only track landings, offering no insight into exactly where the fish came from.
- 8.
Before the new SSF Guidelines, such consideration was also called for by the 1995 FAO Code of Conduct for Responsible Fisheries.
- 9.
We agree with Johnson (2006) that small-scale fisheries are not categorically sustainable even if they are often valorized as such. Unsustainable small-scale fisheries practices should also be addressed, as called for by the SSF Guidelines.
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Gunakar, S., Jadhav, A., Bhatta, R. (2017). Protections for Small-Scale Fisheries in India: A Study of India’s Monsoon Fishing Ban. In: Jentoft, S., Chuenpagdee, R., Barragán-Paladines, M., Franz, N. (eds) The Small-Scale Fisheries Guidelines. MARE Publication Series, vol 14. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-55074-9_14
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