This issue was designed as a special edition to complement ICSF's campaign celebrating the contributions of small-scale fisheries to nutrition and food security within a human-rights-based framework. As the SAMUDRA Comment notes, the COVID-19 pandemic reminds us of the connection between food, health systems, sustainable development and human rights, and offers an opportunity to build back and build forward better.

The articles in this edition of SAMUDRA Report – from 10 countries in Africa, Asia, South America and Oceania – reflect on the pandemic's impacts on fisheries, and situates the components of food security in the lives and livelihoods of SSF in several countries.

The individual articles are as follows:

Indonesia: COVID-19 lockdown measures have struck small-scale fishers

United States: COVID-19 relief measures have favoured industrial operators

Brazil: COVID-19 threatens the lives and livelihoods of vulnerable indigenous communities in the Amazon

Malawi: Fish is an unrecognized element of trade in the Southern African Development Community (SADC)

Ghana: A study explored how access to affordable small fish will reduce hunger and improve nutrition

Indonesia: The unique flavours of the East Java cuisine come from the traditional fish processing technique of pindang

Timor-Leste: The island nation is closing the gender gap while also providing food security

India: Managed sensibly, inland water bodies can provide the country with sustainable food security

India: The use of fishmeal to grow shrimp is exporting the precious nutrition that India’s children deserve

Analysis: A roadmap is needed for the role of fish in the right to food and nutrition

Nigeria: More than COVID-19 itself, the lockdowns have hit the country's unorganized small-scale fishers harder

Pacific Islands: The push for 30 percent MPAs must not bypass the democratic route used by small island nations to improve fisheries and incomes

Analysis: The 1960 UN Conference on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) failed to reach agreement, with India, Chile and Ecuador playing decisive roles

SSF / Blue Economy: There is no reason to wait for consensus on what is justice before acting on injustice in small-scale fisheries

Review: An award-winning film captures the complexities of small-scale fishers and fish processors in West Africa