Sustainable Inland and Coastal Fisheries: Key Lessons Drawn from Community-based Fisheries Management in Bangladesh

Aim: To build an appropriate basis for inland and coastal fisheries co-management through the involvement of key government agencies, fishers, traders and relevant stakeholders.

Study Design: Literature review of the community-based fisheries management projects in Bangladesh during 1995-2017 and examine fisher’s perceptions of co-management approaches from an inclusive cross-section of fishing households.

Place and Duration of Study: The study sites are located in six riverine districts in Bangladesh, namely Bhola, Chandpur and Laxmipur within fish sanctuary areas and Barisal, Pirojpur and Jhalokathi outside fish sanctuary areas.

Methodology: The study included community-based fisheries management project’s knowledge in different inland and coastal habitat types in Bangladesh. The study comprised on lessons learned from field activities, workshops on fisheries co-management with the public, NGOs, experts, civil society, fisher’s organizations, traders and related stakeholders, and reviews of several reports on other community-based fisheries management initiatives in Bangladesh. The study also examined stakeholder perceptions of co-management approaches from a cross-section of 1200 fishing households in 24 fishing villages.

Results: Results indicated that performance of community-based fisheries management in Bangladesh varied widely to improve natural fish production, fish abundance and biodiversity and, with the nature of the community involved. These include the development capabilities of user groups through formation of village level Conservation Groups and fish landing center-based organizations, and capabilities of the key government agencies and law enforcing agencies for enhancing compliance.

Conclusions: This paper proposes a co-management arrangement for fishery management along the fish sanctuary areas of the Padma-Meghna River systems in Bangladesh. These findings provided the scientific basis of community managed fisheries management and its applications.