By ScienceDaily, October 11, 2012
A new study by the
Wildlife Conservation Society and James Cook University says that coral reefs
in Aceh, Indonesia are benefiting from a decidedly low-tech, traditional
management system that dates back to the 17th century.
Known as
"Panglima Laot" -- the customary system focuses on social harmony and
reducing conflict among communities over marine resources. According to the
study, reefs benefitting from Panglima Laot contain as much eight time more
fish and hard-coral cover due to mutually agreed upon gear restrictions
especially prohibiting the use of nets.
The study, which
appears in the October issue of the journal Oryx, is by Stuart Campbell, Rizya
Ardiwijaya, Shinta Pardede, Tasrif Kartawijaya, Ahmad Mukmunin, Yudi Herdiana
of the Wildlife Conservation Society; and Josh Cinner, Andrew Hoey, Morgan
Pratchett, and Andrew Baird of James Cook University.
The authors say
Panglima Laot has a number of design principles associated with successful
fisheries management institutions. These include clearly defined membership
rights, rules that limit resource use, the right of resource users to make,
enforce and change the rules, and graduated sanctions and mechanisms for
conflict resolution. These principles are the key to the ability of the
institution to reduce conflict among communities, provide sustainable access to
marine resources, and limit the destruction of marine habitats.
"No-take
fishing areas can be impractical in regions where people rely heavily on reef
fish for food," said the study's lead author Dr. Stuart Campbell of the
Wildlife Conservation Society. "The guiding principle of Panglima Laot was
successful in minimizing habitat degradation and maintaining fish biomass
despite ongoing access to the fishery. Such mechanisms to reduce conflict are
the key to success of marine resource management, particularly in settings
which lack resources for enforcement."
However, the
institution has not been uniformly successful. In particular, reef conditions
in the adjacent island group of Pulau Aceh were poor possibly because of
destructive fishing and poor coastal management. The precise causes of this
breakdown of the Panglima Laot system are the focus of current research efforts
in the region.
Other work by WCS
and James Cook University suggests that fishers who are poorer and had lower
levels of participation in resource management, had correspondingly lower
levels of both trust in local institutions and involvement in community events.
These groups subsequently felt less benefit from the customary PL system. In
these places fishing is largely uncontrolled.
When the PL system
is strong, and motivated by the aim of producing social harmony, restrictions
on gear use by the Panglima Laot in Aceh have direct conservation benefits such
as high coral cover and enhanced fish biomass.
Additional
surveys over a wider geographical scale and over a longer period are required
to reveal whether these findings also apply across larger scales and over time.
Story Source:
The above story is reprinted from materials provided by Wildlife Conservation Society.
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