Thanks to contributor Phil Karp for sharing this great example of how peer-peer knowledge exchange can help to replicate and scale up innovative solutions.
For communities, by communities
Experience from around the world shows that managing fisheries and marine resources works best when responsibility is placed in the hands of local communities. This is particularly true in low-income countries, where there is often limited capacity and infrastructure for fisheries management and conservation.
Locally Managed Marine Areas (LMMAs) are areas of ocean managed by coastal communities to help protect fisheries and safeguard marine biodiversity. Found throughout the world’s tropical and subtropical seas, and encompassing diverse approaches to management and governance, their sizes and contexts vary widely, but all share the common theme of placing local communities at the heart of management.
International perspectives and regional experiences
In August 2016, following an invitation from Blue Ventures, staff from WWF Mozambique and Abdala Moto, a member of a fishing community in the Quirimbas archipelago, travelled across the Mozambique channel with me to join our learning exchange to Madagascar. Here, they witnessed the opening of a short-term octopus fisheries closure, and were impressed to see the increased catches and incomes for local fishers thanks to the fast growing nature of octopus.
Read more about Blue Ventures and how you can get involved here.
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