The management of natural resources in general is the overall responsibility of the Department of Natural Resources. However, in the field, the Department of Agricultural, Technical and Extension Services (Agritex) co-ordinates all conservation activities except the management of water in the reservoir. Agritex provides resource maps and blueprints describing land use patterns, presents them to people in rural areas, and provides back-up service such as funds or seedlings.
The District Council has created the Natural Resources Committee (NRC) which is responsible for decision-making and enforcement of regulations governing the conservation and utilization of natural resources (see Figure 2). Membership of the NRC comprises all ward councillors and one non-councillor member. The Council employs “rangers” who enforce regulations. At the village level, the Ward Councillors work with the Village Development Committees (VIDCO). The secretary for conservation at the VIDCO level reports on the status of natural resources. The chairman reports to the Councillor who in turn reports to the NRC.
NRC provides a functioning mechanism for the management of natural resources within the district, except the management of fishery resources which has remained the responsibility of the DNPWM in collaboration with other government departments (see Figure 3 and Table 2). The research division of DNPWM draws up fish conservation regulations in collaboration with the management division. The latter is responsible for enforcement of management measures. The research division is responsible for fish stock assessment of the reservoir in collaboration with Agritex. Management decision-making is shared between DNPWM and the District Council; DNPWM decides what the fishing effort should be, the mesh size and the number of gillnets. The District Council decides who and how many fishermen can fish in the reservoir (see Figure 3 and Table 2).
The findings of the RRA showed that the existing management of fisheries in Mwenje Dam did not ensure sustainable utilization of the resource. There was no single authority that co-ordinated management of natural resources including fisheries at the district level. At the central government level those who were responsible for making the management decisions i.e. the research division of DNPWM, were not responsible for enforcing them. Enforcement was supposed to be done by the management division of DNPWM. Though the research division requested catch records from the fishermen, these were never obtained. The fishermen took advantage of this confusion and did as they pleased.
A new organizational structure was difficult to design. There were no traditional institutions or customs that exercised control on the community with regard to fisheries. There was no spiritual medium, such as Nyaminyami, the “water god” of Kariba, that controlled the use of waters during pre-colonial days. The fishery resource was regarded as open access property --just as the river (Rukowa) impounded to create the reservoir was open to every one. The community still referred to the reservoir as Rukowa (river). The reservoir was therefore supposed to be accessible to all, though the people of the community recognised themselves as the primary beneficiaries of the resource. Thus there was no traditional institution that controlled fishing.
| National Parks (R) | National Parks (M) | Agritex | District Council | |
| Fishing regulations | X | |||
| Enforcement | X | X ? | ||
| Management decision1 | X | X | ||
| Management decision2 | X | |||
| Stock assessment | X ? | X | ||
| Monitoring catches | X ? | X |
X = they do it
X ? = they are supposed to do it but do not always do it
R = research division
M = management division
1 = who should fish in the reservoir
2 = what fishing effort and fishing gear should be allowed in the reservoir
There were also no local government administrative structures which could take up fisheries management. Further, there was no structure that managed natural resources across administrative boundaries. Natural resources were managed at the ward level by the six village conservation secretaries for each ward. They reported to the chairman of VIDCO who reported to the councillor who in turn reported to the NRC. If the reservoir was under one ward it would be relatively easy to use existing ward conservation committees to undertake fisheries management.
There was a consensus at a “steering” committee meeting soon after the RRA that creation of a new community structure that would cut across existing administrative boundaries -- “a Dam Committee” -- was necessary (Figure 4). The Dam Committee would be composed of representatives from villages around the reservoir irrespective of their ward. The Dam Committee would be responsible to the NRC for fisheries management in the reservoir (Figure 4). The chairman of the Dam Committee would be co-opted into the NRC.
NRC = Natural Resources Committee
WADCO = Ward Development Committee
VIDCO = Village Development Committee
The first task in setting up a Dam Committee was to create awareness and ensure broad acceptance of the Steering Committee's recommendations. Meetings were held with traditional village leaders, local councillors and businessmen who have influence over the community. Meetings were also held with local and central government officials who work and reside in the area. Those involved in this early awareness campaign were chairmen of all 12 VIDCOs in two wards of Chiwororo and Nyota, the local community workers, officials from the Department of Political Affairs, Agritex extension workers and those from the Agritex fisheries unit based in Harare, district council officials and an official from Natural Resources Board based in Glendale. This broad base was required to advise the community on administration and management options. The success of community-based management depends on both social control and community sanctions to enable enforcement of rules.
The community leaders drafted a constitution to create the new community institution with the assistance of ALCOM. Under this constitution, only villages with land adjoining the reservoir would be involved in management of the reservoir. The constitution (Appendix 1) was submitted through the Natural Resources Committee to the District Council. The District Council accepted the constitution, paving the way for the creation of the Mwenje Dam Fisheries Committee.
The Mwenje Dam Committee was founded on May 22, 1992 -- almost one year after the idea of the Dam Committee was accepted by the NRC. The Dam Committee had 40 delegates. 10 villagers were elected from each of the four villages. 25% of them were women. The committee elected a smaller management committee with four office bearers and eight fish wardens. Under the new constitution the Dam Committee held quarterly meetings (delegates conferences), and the Fisheries Management Committee held monthly meetings to decide on a management strategy for the reservoir. It is mainly gillnetters (7 of 8), who were appointed as fish guards, because they knew the dam and the fishing activities and had boats. One out of four office bearers was a gillnetter. There was one woman in the Management Committee.
To effectively make decisions about fishery resources, the District Council required appropriate authority status. This authority would be delegated to the community.
In terms of Section 95 of the Parks and Wildlife Act (1992), the Minister may appoint a rural council to be the Appropriate Authority. This appropriate authority may:
LEGEND:
NRC = Natural Resources Committee
FC = Fisheries Committee (Dam Committee)
VIDCO = Village Development Committee
Under the present legal framework in Zimbabwe, community-based management institutions can manage fishery resources only when the Rural District Council is the appropriate authority of the reservoir. By virtue of this authority they could receive licence fees and issue fishing licences. The authority would also be responsible for management support for the reservoir (Figure 5). The authority would adopt or create its own fishing by-laws to enforce regulations on the reservoir. For Mwenje Dam, the Chiweshe District Council was to be the Appropriate Authority and this authority was to be delegated to the Mwenje Dam Committee, which acts as the appropriate authority for the management of Mwenje Dam fisheries. Agritex continue to offer assistance with fish surveys and monitoring of the fishery while the Department of National Parks and Wildlife Management offers management support to the Fisheries Committee.
The Dam Committee at Mwenje now issues fishing licences and collects fees. This is the first time in Zimbabwe that a community institution has been empowered to issue fishing licences.
The process of securing appropriate authority for Mwenje has been very slow indeed. An application was sent by Chiweshe District Council in January 1992, but never formally answered till April 1994. When the Council was merged with Mazoe Rural Council in July 1993, appropriate authority was given by default, because Mazoe already had it for its part of the dam and all other dams within the council area.
The delay seriously affected community management work because the Dam Committee lost momentum and motivation when decisions concerning fishing by-laws and implementation of management plans had to be postponed several times.
Fisheries management aims at optimal returns from a fish stock. The most common objective of fisheries management is the optimal biological performance of the system. This means that fishing effort is allowed to increase to a point where the long-term yield from the fishery in terms of weight is at its highest. The yield at this point is called the maximum sustainable yield. This assumes that the performance of the fishery is known or can be known; that the aquatic system is stable and there is adequate control of the fishing effort. None of these assumptions holds for any fishery let alone the fisheries in small water bodies. The biological performance of the fish stocks is unknown for small water bodies in Zimbabwe. Most reservoirs are extremely unstable because of the recurrence of droughts and the heavy drawdown for irrigation. The fishing effort is unknown due to the multiplicity of fishing gears whose fishing efficiency is unknown.
The other objective is to maximize the economic performance of the fishery (Maximum Economic Yield, MEY). In this case the fishing effort is allowed to increase to the point where the difference between total costs (of fishing effort) and total revenues is greatest. In a regulated fishery, no new entrants into the fishery or increased effort can be allowed beyond this point. As with MSY it cannot be calculated unless the performance of the fishery is known, and one needs information on the cost of fishing effort.
Fisheries catch data, from which the fisheries potential could be estimated, are not available for Mwenje dam. Hence, empirical models based on environmental parameters, which were derived from work on large water bodies, have been used to estimate the potential at Mwenje.
Table 3 lists the measured physical parameters of Mwenje dam, while Table 4 shows the predicted yield potential of the dam on the basis of four different models that use the morpho-edaphic index (MEI), a concept that is explained below.
The following definitions will enable an understanding of the models and the tables, including the MEI.
Mean depth: the average depth.
Mean conductivity: Measures the ability of water to conduct an electric current, and indicates the relative degrees of the total concentration of all dissolved ions in water.
Morpho-edaphic index, MEI: is a ratio of conductivity and mean depth.
The four models, which are in the form of equations, are reproduced below. Models 1 and 4 were developed by Henderson and Welcomme (1974). Model 4 was developed for African lakes in particular. Model 2, which introduces the effect of area, was developed by Toews and Griffith (1979). Model 3 was developed by Schlesinger and Reglier (1982) for lakes with mean depth less than 25m. It includes temperature as a parameter.
In these models, Y refers to the total yield in kg/ha/yr; MEI = Conductivity/ mean depth; A = area in sq.km; T= mean temperature.
| Model 1 | Y = 14.3136 MEI0.4681 |
| Model 2 | Log Y = 1.4071 + 0.3697 Log MEI - .00004565A |
| Model 3 | Log Y = .05T + .28 Log MEI + .236 |
| Model 4 | Log Y = 23.281 MEI0.447 |
Table 3
Measured and known parameters of Mwenje dam.
| Area | 473 ha |
| Catchment area | 557 sq km |
| Volume | 43.02 million cubic metres |
| Mean depth | 3.0 m |
| Mean area | 236.5 ha |
| Morpho-edaphic index | 44.33 |
| Mean temperature | 25.5 Deg. C |
| Conductivity | 133 |
Table 4
Predicted fish yield at Mwenje using the morpho-edaphic
index in four different models
| Predictive model | Kg/ha/yr | Tons per year |
|---|---|---|
| Model 1 | 84.5 | 19.97 |
| Model 2 | 103.67 | 24.52 |
| Model 3 | 93.77 | 22.18 |
| Model 4 | 126.79 | 29.98 |
Note: The mean depth of Mwenje is 9.1m when full, the mean area is equivalent to half the surface area, i.e. 236.5 ha, while the mean residence time is estimated at .09 years. The dam experiences heavy drawdown because of its use for water at Cluff Mines in Bindura and for irrigation. This drastically reduces the mean depth to approximately one-third, i.e. 3 metres. Table 4 shows the predicted yield at a mean area of 236.5 ha.
Table 4 shows that Mwenje dam can yield between 84.5 and 126.79 kg/ha/yr (on the basis of Models 1 to 4), depending on which of the four models is used. This means an annual yield of between 19.97 and 29.88 tonnes
The present daily yields are between 2 and 3 kg per 100m of gillnets, according to fishermen. Ten nets are being legally used, but there are possibly twice as many illegal fishermen.
The maximum fishing effort allowed by the DNPWM is 32 nets, each 100m long. Assuming that the fishermen fish 260 days a year, legal fishermen would land between 5.2 and 7.8 tonnes of fish per year. However, the level of fish poaching in Mwenje being high, total gillnet yields including those of poachers could be as high as between 16 and 24 tonnes per year, based on a fishing effort of 30 gillnets.
Hook and line yields are approximately 500g per day per person. An estimated 75 to 100 people fish every day except during the coldest months (June-July). This gives a yield of approximately 10–14 tonnes per year.
The yield from traps, throw nets, kamukore and other illegal gear has not been possible to estimate. Each of these gears, however, has a limited fishing season.
The combined estimated catch of all gillnet (legal and illegal) and hook and line fishermen is approximately 26–38 tonnes. Of this total, legal fishermen and hook and line fishermen land between 15.2 and 21.8 tonnes. This is roughly the same as the yield predictions based on MEI. But the mean yield of legal gillnetters is lower than the predicted MEI yields.
Both yield estimates -- those from fishermen and from the MEI -- are rough estimates. They do not answer the question whether the dam is overfished, or whether production is below optimum. However, fishermen claimed during the RRA at Mwenje that fish size has been declining, indicating overfishing. Because of the declining fish size, many fishermen have begun to use smaller gillnet mesh sizes and small-mesh seine nets. During the dry season, when the water level is low, heavy fishing takes place -- increasing the possibility of overfishing.
A well-managed dam makes it possible to introduce enhancement measures -- such as protected breeding areas, stocking and cage culture -- for the fisheries.
The overall objective of the Dam Committee was to increase fish yields for legal fishermen in Mwenje Dam, but there were no fisheries catch data to base its decisions on. The RRA findings showed that the dam is fished by both legal and an unknown number of illegal fisherman. Fishermen claimed that fish size was declining. Aware of this information the Fisheries Committee was able to propose management option, determine who had access to the fisheries, distribute the allowable fishing effort, decide on the types of fishing gears, fishing regulations and methods of enforcing the regulations.
As a first step the community decided on
Through the monthly meetings of the Dam Committee discussions were held on who should be allowed access to the reservoir fisheries. The Dam Committee invited local councillors, village headmen, VIDCO chairmen, businessmen and local government officials to discuss the issue. There was a broad consensus that only villages with shores bordering the reservoir should be involved in administration and management decisions concerning the reservoir. Their proximity to the reservoir was considered to be an advantage in policing the reservoir. Four villages were selected: Nyachuru, Mufuka, Munyengeterwa and Chemadzimbabwe. Access to the reservoir for fishing was to be limited to licence holders only. Gillnet fishing licences were restricted to community members of the four villages while rod and line fishing licences were accessible to all. Residents of the four VIDCOs were to pay a lower fee than outsiders because of their role in protecting the fishery resource. Fishing licence fees for each gear type were suggested (see management plans for Mwenje dam in Appendix 2).
A debate was held on the fishing methods used in the dam. A list of the different methods was drawn up (Table 5). Local fishermen discussed the fish species caught by each method and the advantages and disadvantages of each method. This was backed up by experimental data obtained by ALCOM through test fishing in the reservoir. The fishing gears were matched against the fish species in the dam (Table 5). The national fishing regulations contained in the Parks and Wildlife Act (1992) were taken to be a guide throughout the discussions.
A decision was made by the committee that only rod and line and gillnets would be permitted in the reservoir. The gillnet mesh size was restricted to a minimum of three inches. The Dam Committee felt that it did not know enough about the effect of the use of some of the traditional fishing gear that catch small fish species, and that control of use was difficult, but left room for later review. This meant that traps were forbidden altogether. A small mesh gillnet (1" mesh size) which catches adult size B. paludinosus and Micralestes acutidens when set overnight in the deep waters was approved by the Committee after examining the catch by one of the fishermen. No juvenile tilapia fish species were found in the catch. The same net, when used as a seine net in shallow waters, catches juvenile fish of all large fish species.
Prior to the setting up of community-based management, the Department of National Parks and Wildlife Management had authorised a maximum of 32 gillnets each 100m long to be set per day in Mwenje dam. In the absence of catch data the Committee agreed that the maximum number of nets should remain at 32. This would give an estimated yield of between 10 and 25 tons. The distribution was skewed in favour of Chemadzimbabwe village which had a co-operative with 20 gillnets. The Committee agreed to re-distribute the gillnets equally between the four villages. It was interesting that the co-operative members who are also members of the fisheries committee suggested that the number of gillnets should be re-distributed. It was learnt that the co-operative was set up as a fishing cooperative; but in practice its main purpose was to facilitate funds for purchase of nets. Individual members operated their own nets. Thus each village was entitled to eight gillnets regardless of the length of the village shoreline (Table 4). The VIDCO chairman of each village was requested to choose those who would obtain a gillnet fishing permit.
The management committee of Mwenje Dam discussed in detail several issues on how to manage the dam. Recommendations on each issue were presented to the general meeting which either rejected or adopted them. Management plans (Appendix 2) were drawn up later on the basis of the resolutions arrived at by each general meeting.
The management plans stated clearly the type of fishing gear that could be used and who was eligible to obtain a fishing licence. Gillnet licences are restricted to residents of the four villages. Rod and line fishing licences fall into two categories: one for residents of the four villages and another for outsiders. The residents of the commercial farm on the south bank are considered as residents for the purpose of obtaining cheaper rod and line licences only and are not eligible for gillnet licences. Provisions have been made for fishing licences for other fishing gear. The management plans specify the fines for various offenses. A summary of the fishing licence fees and fines is given in Table 7. The management plans were put into effect from the 1st of July 1993. These plans would need further fine-tuning during the implementation.
Fishing by-laws (in “Management plans,” Appendix 2) for Mwenje dam were drafted by the Committee with the assistance of ALCOM, DNPWM, Department of Community Development and Agritex. The national fishing regulations as contained in the Parks and Wildlife Act (1992) were adapted to Mwenje dam. The Committee debated and agreed on the levels of fishing licence fees for Mwenje dam for different categories of fishermen (Appendix 2). The fishing by-laws are enforced by the Committee on behalf of the District Council since the latter is the appropriate authority.
Effective control means that the fishing by-laws should be enforced by those who introduced them. This control requires not only the support of the legal system but also community control through social sanctions imposed by community leaders. Traditional leaders were invited to discuss ways by which they could assist in exercising control on law breakers. They gave their commitment to enforcing the fishing by-laws. The Department of National Parks was also invited to discuss how it could assist the fisheries committee in controlling fish poaching. Broad agreement was reached to assist the Committee to control fish poaching.
ALCOM felt that the Dam Committee tended to represent the gillnetters and not the whole community (including the women fishers). One could argue that the rod and liners would pay for what was essentially a gillnet fishery.
The enforcement of fishing by-laws was initially effective, but problems cropped up later. The gillnet fishermen continued to use the same small mesh nets well after the fishing by-laws came into effect. Thus while they were agreeing to follow the fishing by-laws at meetings, by night they did as they pleased. The former fish poachers, the men who were using the kamukore and javu, and the women who dominated the illegal seine net fishery, were quick to learn that the gillnet fishermen were not observing the fishing by-laws that were agreed upon. They felt cheated and they too went back to fishing. The women who used to fish during the day began to fish during the night together with the men. It became clear that law enforcement would be difficult if not impossible. Before long the payment of fees for rod and line fishing went down as people refused to pay the fees unless illegal fishing stopped.
A meeting of the traditional community leaders and the Dam Committee was called to discuss the issue. The Committee also sought the assistance of the Department of National Parks and Wildlife Management to control the poaching. Offices from the Department of National Parks and Wildlife the poaching. National Parks officers came for a day and a night. Some people were arrested, including a gillnetter in the Committee, and enforcement improved.
While fairly effective enforcement was achieved, a lot remains to be done to make the decision-makers respect their own rules. The support to the Dam Committee from National Parks makes the Dam Committee realise that it actually had power to call upon government agents to assist it, a fact that the Committee barely believed at first. The community then began to take the Dam Committee more seriously. Payment of fees for hook and line fishing picked up, and the gillnetters paid their arrears. According to the fish guards, the use of illegal gear has decreased.
