Investigating the Challenges and Successes of Community Participation in the Fishery Co-management Program on Lake Victoria, East Africa.

Abstract

Formal fishery co-management institutions facilitate collaboration between national governments and local communities. The intent of co-management is to empower fishing communities to self-organize and conduct sustainable fishery management. This dissertation investigates the challenges and successes of this approach, focusing on community fishery management organizations called Beach Management Units (BMUs), on Lake Victoria, East Africa. To determine what degree community participation is necessary in fishery management, it is valuable to identify the appropriate relationship with central governments, since natural resources are often under their trust. I first compared approaches to fishery management on two major fresh water fisheries, the Laurentian Great Lakes and Lake Victoria. Results revealed the necessity for stronger community inclusion on Lake Victoria due to the nature of dependence on the fishery by a large number of the population’s livelihoods. Community inclusion requires central government involvement in the form of devolving appropriate amount of authority and financial resources for communities to administer fishery management. There is often a disproportionate distribution of fiscal and authoritative resources by government, thus challenging the ability of the community to adequately function as resource management entities. As a result of discordant resource distribution, communities must administer a large part of the fishery management program on their own. I investigated, therefore, community self-organization within, and prior to, the co-management program. I determined that communities exhibited stronger self-organization characteristics more often at BMUs which had pre-existing organizations, than those communities that did not. This was likely due to stronger social-cohesion of the community. Finally, I discovered that authorities not appointed for fishery management often conducted management activities, thus disrupting the operations of the BMU. These disruptions result in BMUs’ legitimacy being compromised, and thus unable to administer fishery management. Fishery co-management is a compelling approach for its inclusion of communities and cooperation with government; inefficiencies, however, must be addressed for more successful community-level management to occur. Government must contribute appropriate resources; informal self-organizational characteristics should be considered for their contribution to the formal co-management program; and roles of all stakeholders must be clear so community management efforts aren’t disrupted.