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Management Systems Must Have the Support of the Fishers
Fisheries management must be done in consultation with the people directly dependent on the fishery in question, and our solution should state as such. The people who will make the day to day management decisions need to sincerely and respectfully listen to the views of the fishers, even if they do not always follow the fishers' advice. Additionally, the actual enforcement of rules must be done in the least offensive way possible. I have in mind one of the people we met at Gloucester: You could tell how being hostilely stopped and questioned while doing research work in a closed area aggravated him. Excessively heavy-handed, paternalistic, or otherwise insulting management policies are likely to invite attempts to overturn them, and thus contribute nothing to the solving the problem.
Comments on 11
I believe this essay brings up many good points - the need for support on the local level, as well as the importance of local management. However, I also think it overlooks some bigger problems and successes demonstrated in the past. The fishery problem is a global fisheries problem, as well as a globe of local fishery problems. When one country will not cease fishing out of international waters or waters belonging by law to another country, the problem is not local, but global. When the fishing economy and market tie many different countries together, both developed and developing, the problem is most definitely not local, but global. Because many of the problems leading to a global fishery collapse, in this global age, involve at least more than one country or region, if not all regions at one time, the problem cannot merely be viewed as a collection of local tribulations or a real solution will not be developed. For these reasons, top-down pressure is definitely, in some cases, a required component of the solution. - Claudia
10 Emily
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Our UTF, Alison, and our group (Team 7) had discussed the viability of various plans especially in regards to disparities in economic ability to pay. We had thrown around the idea of creating regional caucuses that would be "in charge" of an area of regional water as a collective, so that the more economically stable countries can provide some of the capital in exchange for abidance of rules by the developing countries; ideally, this will pair resources with need so that everyone has a better fish population in general. Furthermore, we felt it addressed the differences in management as required by area. The International group probably has a better idea of the feasibility of this idea, but I just wanted to throw it out there.
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