Our Sustainable Fishing Project (SFP) gives fishermen the opportunity to transition from unsustainable fishing, such as gill netting, to more sustainable methods, such as kayak pole and line fishing. This project is in conjunction with the indigenous fishing communities and is locally led. This will allow the coastal communities of Jangamo to survive this difficult time by harvesting protein from the sea, but allow them to do so in a sustainable manner – a win for the sea, and the people!

LTO is working to provide kayaks, fishing rods and safety equipment on a ‘check in, check out’ basis through our SFP. In order to participate in this initiative, fishermen must give up their current method of fishing if it is gill-netting or spear-fishing. They must also attend a compulsory workshop developed by one of our marine biologists, and delivered by our Community Outreach Manager (COM) who is trained and experienced in sustainability. Fishermen must ‘check in’ and ‘check out’ equipment with our COM for both equipment control, and safety precautions. Each fishermen must take a personal buoyancy device with them, and a communication device (radio/phone). Fishermen are not allowed to anchor. Once back on land, the fishermen must also report their catches to our COM to allow us to monitor the progress of the project.

The Science

At LTO, all of our community projects are built off sound scientific research, and our SFP is no different. Our research over the last 5 years has shown a decline in the number of large herbivorous fish on our local reefs. Herbivorous fish like parrotfish are crucial to maintaining a healthy reef system. Herbivores graze on algae which colonizes the bare rocks that corals need to be able to expand and grow. Algae outcompetes corals for space on the rock and without herbivores keeping these algae in check, it can result in limited coral growth, and destruction of coral reefs.

Over the last 5 years LTO has studied our local reef systems using 25m transects. We’ve collected data on corals at different locations on each site using photo quadrats assessing percentage composition of coral, and coral competitors. We’ve also done swims around each transect assessing non-cryptic reef fish composition, and cryptic fish composition. Our results from these surveys have shown a huge lack of large excavator herbivores, and a growing number of corallivores, which prey on corals. This lack of herbivores is especially worrying as it can affect coral composition, recruitment and survival rates. Other studies have shown that the presence of grazers is positively associated with coral recruitment, suggesting that herbivores directly facilitate reef building taxa.

The lack of larger herbivores could be caused by a number of reasons, one of which is overexploitation. Research around the world has shown that biomass can be twice as high in locations not accessed by fisheries and that fishing alters the structure of the herbivore community by disproportionately reducing biomass of large bodied functional groups like excavators, scrapers, grazers, browsers and detritivores.

Specifics of Our Area

Overexploitation of the local reefs of Jangamo happen by 2 methods of fishing: spearfishing and gill-netting. Spearfishing is a targeted method of fishing with little bycatch, which usually is positive. However, the shelf of Jangamo is steep and strong surface currents and often adverse weather conditions mean spearfishermen are not able to swim far out to sea. The lack of boats means spearfishermen swim from shore and are limited to fishing on the shallow, local reefs. The larger fish available on these local reefs are often herbivores, which could account for the drop in numbers of large excavators and other larger herbivorous fish.

We also know that gill-netting is prolific in this region, with long, unmanned nets cast close to shore and left unattended for hours on end. These nets are usually swam out and placed on local reefs. This means the fishing is limited once again to local areas, targeting the same vulnerable fish population as the spearfishermen. Gill nets are renowned for being unselective and our data has shown a huge range of fish caught, including reef, herbivorous fish and elasmobranchs.

The combined fishing pressure of the gill-netters & spear fishermen on the local reefs could be one of the reasons for the lack of large herbivores in the area. This selective fishing pressure can be addressed by transitioning the community away from these fishing methods, towards more sustainable fishing methods like kayak fishing.

Kayak fishing enables selective fishing (no by-catch), in deeper waters, allowing the fishermen to target piscivore fish, which are generally bigger in size, producing more meat for the consumer and pelagic. Piscivore fish prey on other fish like herbivores, and by targeting these we may be able to address the lack of larger herbivores in the reef system. Kayaks will enable the fishermen to fish away from the local reefs, giving the reef fish population a chance to recover. This would ultimately benefit the corals, and especially reef-building taxa such as the Acropora spp.

If you’d like to get involved in our Sustainable Fishing Project through sponsorship or partnership, please contact us.