Abstract
Historically, small-scale inland fisheries have been overlooked. Management practices based on industrial fishing, rarely take into account vital factors such as complex socio-environmental relations. This paper aims to help address this gap, contributing to a better understanding of small-scale inland fisheries. It uses the Pantanal wetland of Brazil as a case study, in which policymakers established restrictive fishing rules based on claims that local overfishing had caused numbers of recreational fishing tourists to decline. Through multiple regressions, participatory observation and mapping, this paper deconstructs the environmental narrative and uncovers the area's complex traditional system of use. The case study, firstly illustrates the adverse consequences of misconceived top-down fishing management practices and, how such environmental narratives may be deconstructed. Then it presents important aspects of customary management in inland floodplains fisheries, including high levels of mobility within a common property regime and unexploitable reserves. It concludes by analysing recently proposed categories of property regimes, identifying fundamental elements that must be taken into account in designing appropriate management policies in inland floodplain fisheries.
Highlights
Industrial fishing has been part of the global conservation agenda since the beginning of the twentieth century, with much effort put into developing tools and techniques for accurate evaluation of the status, economic significance and best conservation practices of industrial fishing (Pauly et al 2003; Norse et al 2012; Watts et al 2009; Costello et al 2016)
This paper examines a conflict regarding inland fisheries in the Pantanal wetland, whereby policymakers despite having no research-based evidence, accuse local people of overfishing and driving the drastic reduction in tourist numbers coming to the region for recreational fishing
A comparable change in Pacu minimum legal size led to a further decrease of 3000 tourists and, each kilo added to the tourist quota, increased the number of people coming to fish in the Southern Pantanal by almost 300
Summary
Industrial fishing has been part of the global conservation agenda since the beginning of the twentieth century, with much effort put into developing tools and techniques for accurate evaluation of the status, economic significance and best conservation practices of industrial fishing (Pauly et al 2003; Norse et al 2012; Watts et al 2009; Costello et al 2016). Catch statistics used to assess species stocks in artisanal fisheries are based on industrial practices; and normally. Small-scale fisheries catches are thought to be greatly underreported (Welcomme et al 2010; Cooke et al 2016). Management practices are based on industrial fisheries, largely on models of single species fished by one type of gear (Welcomme et al 2006). This approach is disconnected from the complex realities of small-scale fisheries and inadequate to predict changes in fish species assemblages and local livelihoods (Welcomme 1999)
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