Global Forum on Food Security and Nutrition (FSN Forum)

INCIDIR SOBRE LA IMPORTANCIA DE TOMAR EN CUENTA LA PARTICIPACIÓN ACTIVA DE LOS ACTORES INVOLUCRADOS TANTO EN PESCA COMO EN ACUICULTURA.

En línea con el anterior comentario, en la V0 del documento no existe un acápite que haga mención al rol sociol de la pesca y acuicultura, un apartado que visibilize la estructura social-organizacional de estos dos sectores desde el accionar individual del pescador o acuicultor hasta el accionar o (no) de algún tipo de organización y su grado de desarrollo, procurando además medir su interacción con los diferentes actores públicos de diferentes niveles estatales y otros actores relacionados (cooperación internacional, centros de investigación, centros de capacitación, gremios y empresas, etc, etc).

En consecuencia debemos olvidarnos de la estructura netamente vertical de la cadena de valor y visualizar tambien los encadenamientos horizontales; sera posible (en algunos contextos) encontrar alternativas de acción muy eficientes (para la nutrición y para la seguridad alimentaria) no solo al interior de la cadena si no afuera de ella.

Entonces; podría ser valioso también mirar al ser humano (pescador y/o acuicultor) y darle mayor protagonismo en la busqueda de soluciones?; es posible ademas de mirar el recurso o producto (pescado), entender que este no esta disponible para el consumo por cuenta propia? y que entorno a la pesca y acuicultura existen otros elementos que debemos mirarlos?. 

En esa línea podría ser interesante analizar si el enfoque de Complejos Productivos Integrales (C.P.I.) podria adecuarse para este efecto.

En el gráfico adjunto se muestra la integralidad que representa el enfoque de CPI.

Dear CFS – HLPE Secretariat,

Switzerland would like to thank the HLPE for the comprehensive but focused zero draft on “The role of Sustainable Fisheries and Aquaculture for Food Security and Nutrition (FSN)”. We have noted two areas that could be further addressed in the next phase of the research and therefore we suggest to :

• Address more directly existing and future FSN-related impact of climate change for sustainable fisheries and aquaculture  
• Highlight the importance of strengthening and enhancing the effectiveness of organizations (incl. cooperatives), that represent (and are accountable to) small-scale fishers and fish processors, in policy processes as well as in delivering economic services to their members.

Best regards,

Christina Blank

Deputy Permanent Representative

Deputy Head of the Permanent Representation of Switzerland to FAO, IFAD and WFP

Via Aventina 32

00153 Rome

Italy

We appreciate the acknowledgement of the important issues of child and forced labour in the draft document. For further information and recommendations on this issue, we invite you to refer to the FAO-ILO Guidance on addressing child labour in fisheries and aquaculture http://www.fao.org/docrep/018/i3318e/i3318e.pdf

We would also suggest that working conditions and youth employment be given greater attention in the report.

Respective contribution of fisheries and aquaculture to food security and nutrition

For the Philippines, aquaculture production of fish, crustaceans, and mollusks in 2009 produced 0.737 million metric tons and ranked 11th in the world, contributing about 55.68 million metric tons to the total global aquaculture production. In terms of value, aquaculture contributed PhP 82.86 billion or 37.5% to the country’s economy as compared to the PhP 60.46 billion (27.3%) of commercial fisheries (BFAR* 2010 fisheries profile). The per capita food consumption of fish and other fishery products is 11.7% of the total food intake of Filipinos, next to rice.

Women and food security

Filipino women are involved in pre and post fisheries production activities. For example, when a husband fisherman goes out to sea, the wife wakes up early to prepare the food. Likewise, when the husband returns from sea after fishing, part of the catch is locally sold by the woman in the community. The woman also makes sure that the family will get its share from the catch, ensuring the food security of the household.

In some coastal communities, women engage in fry collection, harvesting of sea urchins and sea cucumbers, etc. but these are hardly recognized as fishing activities. They also help in net making and mending activities.

However, many of the important contributions of women in food security and the fisheries sector, in general, are hardly recognized because of the stereotyping of roles in a household wherein it is the responsibility of the woman of the household to take care and nurture the family. Thus, it is deemed as an inherent attribute of her being the mother.

Further, the lack of gender-differentiated data has contributed to the invisibility of women. Even the Philippine Fisheries Profile does not reflect the number of women directly involved in fisheries; data are clustered by sector. It is only very recently that the role and contribution of women in fisheries and resource management has been given some attention.

Environmental sustainability of fisheries and aquaculture and governance

Parallel issues on conservation and poverty pose challenges in the prioritization of activities, particularly at the coastal communities wherein more than 80% of the country’s population reside, often at living standards below poverty line. Conflict in resource use and among resource users are key concerns. In spite of this, many local government units (LGUs) advocate community-based resource management to include participation of the different stakeholders within the community.

Fisheries and aquaculture interaction

Some of the fishmeal, specifically prawn feeds) used in aquaculture are imported from other countries thus it does not pose that much of a problem to human food security but rather increases operational cost to aquaculture. In 2010, prawn feeds accounted for 4% of the total import value in fisheries.

The future of fisheries and aquaculture in the context of foods security

With the dwindling catch from the wild (capture fisheries), it is believed that aquaculture will still be the major source of protein for the country. That is why researches on major fishery commodities like milkfish and shrimps are currently being undertaken by different research institutions throughout the country for sustainable culture practices with the intent of increasing production without adversely affecting the environment.

Contributions by

Farisal U. Bagsit (Researcher),

Caridad N. Jimenez (Faculty),

Institute of Fisheries Policy and Development Studies

College of Fisheries and Ocean Sciences

University of the Philippines Visayas

5023 Miagao, Iloilo, Philippines

COMMENTS ON  ZERO DRAFT  ON THE  ROLE OF   SUSTAINABLE  FISHERIES AND  AQUACULTURE IN  FOOD  SECURITY  AND  NUTRITION (RSFA-FSN)

RSFA-FSN  can   be  contextualized in the  poverty and vulnerability  situation of  fishing communities  in the coastal and marine fisheries, including  inland fisheries. Issues  of   governance  in the  access  to and control  of  the distribution and  valuation of  fish  products must  also  be articulated  as  those are   the  case  why  fishing communities  remain marginalized in  many  developing  countries.

Related  issues  confronting  fishworkers  and aquaculture farm  workers such as  lack of  social protection, unfair labor  conditions, and contractualization  must also be  added  in the context.

In  Indonesia  32% of  the   16.42 million Indonesians living in coastal areas  fall below the poverty line. In the  Philippines, 41%   of   27 percent poor  of the national   population comes  from fishing households. It  would not  be  hard  to  believe that  similar statistics  exist in  fishing communities  of  less  developed  countries in Southeast  Asia.

In  this view,  the  pursuit  for sustainable fisheries and  aquaculture contribution  to FSN  will  be  directly  focused   to   the  higher pursuit of   poverty alleviation and  empowerment  of  poor and marginalized  fishing  communities.  In  this  way,  we would  answer the  question : Food security  for whom?

Page 19-25

Fish products generated from capture fishing and aquaculture are primarily  intended  for food  consumption or  for  cash. Lower  value fish by-catch and losses  from postharvest  activities  are  the  ones  used  for  feeds for aquaculture or  other animal feeds. This  only means that  there  is  a  secondary process  involved  in the production of  feeds.   In the diagram on  page  19, it  appears (because of parallel positioning)   that  feed production  is  also a primary   purpose of  capture fishing and aquaculture  and  not as  a  result  of by-catch from  non-selective  fishing and  post-harvest  losses.

But, if the  diagram  is  correct, maybe  the paper can cite  the  countries where capture fishing and  aquaculture  primarily produce  for the  fishmeal or  feed market.

Pages  39-40

…In the light of these analyses one could hypothesize that the lack of apparent 2 relationship between the huge revenues that are generated by international trade and 3 the food security of the local population reflects the structural failure of the fish export 4 sector and national institutions to ensure an effective (re)distribution of the fish trade 5 revenues and a non-harmful mode of operating…- V.0 RSFA-FSN

Just  to  cite  a  similar  case,  the tuna industry  in  General Santos  City, the Philippines has  a  huge  revenue  in terms of  export  earnings. Revenues  from the  industry  comprise  60% of the economic production of the  city. Revenues  are  reinvested to other  economic  activities that create  jobs and employment.  Despite  these achievement, huge  revenues  has  not addressed the  following issues that make dependent sectors food insecure:

• unfair  sharing  systems in small scale hand-line fishing  boats

• Lacking  social   protection  for  fishworkers in all  economic  scales of  tuna fishing most especially the women workers

• Labor  code  not applicable in the  Philippines since the fishworkers  are not  covered in the law
• Contractualisation of  jobs in tuna canning factories, which unfairly treat women fish processors
• Poverty incidence in the  coastal areas  in General  Santos City and adjacent  Sarangani Province  remained high

Catch composition of  tuna, as a highly  traded  fish product,  are already  mostly juveniles (more than 60%)  and  showing  decreasing trend  of  catch volumes.

Recommendations:

• Social protection for both artisanal and fish workers including women workers have to be proposed -- minimum wage, social security;
• Full valuation of the effort to produce tuna
• Fast  track  ratification  of  ILO and IMO  convention
• Stop unfair treatment of fish workers most especially the women workers
• Conservation/Management concerns due to overfishing of tuna; proposed comprehensive alternative livelihood to the small tuna players if fishing effort/capacity is to be reduced
• Compliance with sea worthiness, safety at sea and working condition
• Regulated  fish trade  for  fisheries  with  evident overfishing  and depletion of  fish  stocks.

Pages 52 -55

On small  scale  aquaculture-

• Aquaculture  in  Southeast  Asia  started  with the more endemic  species  like  gurami and  carp  in  small areas  which  is  intended  for the  food  consumption  of households  and communities. Then  aquaculture was modernized, got  larger, and   expanded  with the orientation  of  serving the  demands of the international  markets, with  developing  countries  supplying  the more  developed  countries. Modernized  aquaculture system  has largely  benefited  from this markets, while small  scale  aquaculture  was  delinked  from  this  development.

• Aquaculture  small holders,  depending  on the particular aquaculture commodities,  have  proven  to  be  beneficial and  has  not  realized its  full  potential  to  contribute  to  FSN and  poverty alleviation in  fishing  communities.  In the Philippines and  Indonesia, small  scale  seaweed  culture  has very  important  contribution  in terms of   increasing  income  of  hundreds of  thousands  of  fishing  households. In the  Philippines  alone there  is  about 250,000  households from benefiting  from  seaweeds culture.  In Vietnam and  Indonesia  small  scale shrimp aquaculture(less than 5  hectares)    constitute  a large share   of  income  sources  of   farming  households (MCD 2012;  KIARA 2012).  The  small scale  sector  provides  the bulk   of  the raw  fish materials  processed  in seafood  factories in  Vietnam.  However, the  sector is  faced  with  high  risk, low profit  and environmental  pollution.

As a solution, governmentsshouldsupportcapacity ofaquaculture small holders ofspecificcommoditiestobeabletocomplywithstandards of goodaquaculture practicestoderivemore benefits.Existing internationalstandardscanbeuseda models and references, but regulationmustbe developedat the local levelto givedue consideration oflocal situation.

Page   77-81

On  the recommendations related  to Global  Policy:

• This   paper on the  RSFA-FSN should  make a  recommendation  in relation to WTO’s  treatment on trade policy  relating to  fish products. Because  WTO has continuously  regarded  and categorized fish products along  automobiles, mobile phones,  cars, and  other industrial   products,  under  the  Non-Agriculture  Market Agreement (NAMA), without  recognizing  fisheries  biological  limits.     Furthermore, the issue of fishery subsidy is being discussed in WTO  separately 
• With this  kind  of treatment on fish products and fisheries, WTO  has,  wittingly or unwittingly,  caused  overcapacity and  overfishing  of  many fisheries  around the  globe.  
• To  serve  FSN , there  must  be regulated  fish  trade regime   specially  to fishing  areas and fish species  where  there  is  already  evidence  of   depletion and  overfishing.
• End WTO, it  only resulted in further marginalization and exclusion of artisanal fishers in economic development.

Recommendation  in  relation to  Women in fisheries:

• This  paper   should  recognize  the  role and  rights  of   women  as  shell gleaners in   mangrove  areas, seagrass beds, tidal flats, and wetlands. Shell  harvesting   by  women and children serve  also as important  source of  marine food for  nutrition and sometimes  supplemental cash  for  fishing  households.  Management efforts must be supported to ensure that the resources used by women are equally given attention with women playing key role and participation.
• Further  study may  be  required  to determine  the extent and reach  of  its  practice in fishing countries and regions.

Additional Comments

• The  paper  can  add   a section on  the  relevance  of  certification.    It  can  articulate  if   certification  of   fish products,  either  caught in  the  wild or  produced  from aquaculture,   has    improved   working  conditions of  fishworkers and  aquaculture  farm workers as a means  to FSN.  Perhaps, also  include a section if   the benefits  from  fish  product certification  has   trickle  down  to   aquaculture small  holders.
• Product Certification and Government Regulation must be installed and encourage  local communities initiatives on regulation

An excellent first draft. Specific comments:

1. Within the key aspect of environmental sustainabilty there is no mention of the area that aquaculture will operate in in future although this is mentioned for capture fisheries: in land or inland and marine waters, in natural ecosystems or human-made agro-ecosystems. I addressed this issue in a keynote recently presented at the Elsevier conference in Las Palmas, Gran Canaria in November, which will be published early next year (abstract attached). Inland aquaculture is likely to continue to be the major source of fish rather than mariculture through both intensification and expansion of farmed area. Although there are limits to land and water, a recent paper by Boyd and Brummett (2012) has indicated that 'renewable freshwater appears adequate for considerable expansion of aquaculture, especially outside Asia'. A significant amount of inland aquaculture production takes place in ponds converted from rice fields and this trend is likely to continue as aquaculture is a more efficent use of land and water, especially than low-yielding rice fields. Isupport the call in the Recommendations for studies on the most efficient use of land and water resources. Research is certainly required on the merits of conversion of the realatively small area of rice fields, especially low-yielding ones, that would be needed to meet the predicted 2050 demand for fish.

2. You cite me several times in Section 3.7  times, although the references are not listed, as well as Little and Edwards (2003) that livestock manure 'supports the production of most cultured fish in Asia'. This is not true anymore as there has been a major delinking of integrated livestock and fish.  The recent rapid increase in aquaculture production has been through intensification using agro-industrial pelleted feed. Total production of pelleted feed increased more than 3 times from 7.6 million tonnes in 1995 to 27.1 million tonnes in 2007 and is expecyed to reach 70.9 million metric tonnes by 2020 (Tacon et al.2012).

3. In Section 3, the poor eat tilapia as well as carps and catfish.

A plant-based diet may not lead to amino acid deficiency e.g. amino acid complementarity in Latin America where the basic diet is not mainly grain but maize and beans.

Dear HLPE Secretariat,

e-HLPE Consultation,

Role of Aquaculture for Food Security and Nutrition About

Due to reducing marine resources and decline some of the marine species in the world, the aquaculture will be more important than fishery and would make the main role in food security. In capture fishery should place emphasis on enhancing quality instead of increasing fishing effort. Because some of the aquatics catches in developing countries by traditional methods are not of good quality and endanger the health of consumers. Then the quality in marine fishery is more important the quantity. In order to gain this matter we need more training and quality control.

Another important consideration in marine fisheries is of marine pollution which has bad effected on catch quality and endangers public health. Nowadays the governments for various reasons, including political and social reasons, have not this issue under consideration. In this way sometimes the fish with low quality and unhealthy distributed in the markets and cause a variety of diseases in the community. For this reason it is necessary to emphasize the issue of preventing marine pollution, particularly oil pollution and some Issues such as the protection of marine resources, the creation of artificial reefs, protecting nursery grounds, and prevent IUU fishing should be emphasized in order to increasing marine supply and improving the quality of fish caught.

With best regards,

Ghazanfar Azadi

[We could comment on aquaculture under the section of “Governance and food security”]

Shrimp aquaculture is often omitted in literature when it comes to food and food security.  This is because; shrimp aquaculture in particular is oriented for export and not for local consumption. Benefits go to large companies and not to local communities. 

However, we have found small-scale shrimp aquaculture in northwestern Sri Lanka operated in a different way (Thesis: Galappaththi 2013) http://mspace.lib.umanitoba.ca/handle/1993/22107?mode=full.

The case provides a unique governance model with implications for aquaculture and food security in general. The shrimp farmers co-operate with each other by working collaboratively and collectively to overcome common challenges (mainly shrimp diseases). The governance system may be characterized as a mixed commons regime.  It is a multi-layered community-based institutional structure, which has been developed by shrimp farmers themselves in cooperation with the government. The top institutional layer is represented by a joint body of government and the sector association. Farming operations are owner-managed under community-level institutions (Samithi=co-op), with government oversight and coordination. Each and every shrimp farmer in the community has to be a member of this particular community association to operate their shrimp farms. Community-level shrimp farming associations formulate and implement their own rules to manage community-level resources.

This private-communal-state mixed commons management regime has evolved as a response to shrimp diseases and their devastating impacts. White Spot Syndrome (WSS) is one of the most critical shrimp diseases. In 1996, the WSS disease outbreak accounted for a huge loss of shrimp harvest and had lasting negative impacts. As a result, many medium and small scale farmers quit the industry and their livelihoods were badly affected. Later, shrimp farmers, industry, and the government collectively managed to develop a mechanism that is capable of battling the spread of shrimp diseases by way of controlling the medium through which the diseases spread -- water. This mechanism is a remarkable achievement of the current governance regime and contributes to securing the livelihood well-being of the community.

Most of the shrimp production is for the export market, but profits and benefits stay in the local community and contribute towards local development and local needs. In 2012, a significant portion (more than 35%) of annual shrimp harvest was sold at the local market. Prevailing market prices offered by shrimp processing companies and local buyers (or middlemen), and size and quality of shrimp determine how much of the shrimp is sold in local markets. Local households and the restaurants tend to buy small shrimp to make curried shrimp to go with rice (staple food of Sri Lanka). We have found that some shrimp farmers cater only to local markets because quality standards for international markets are difficult to meet.

The study area, aquaculture shrimp contribute to food security because aquaculture owners are mostly families and community households. Shrimp harvesting is done in a collective manner with the participation of family members, relatives, and neighbours. Contribution of women is apparent during shrimp harvesting operations, especially, towards the later stage of harvesting, where women hand pick shrimp from muddy pond bottoms. As a means of gratitude, farmers share small portions of harvest with neighbours and relatives.  Another small portion is kept for household consumption..

The Sri Lankan shrimp aquaculture governance model is based on strong traditions of collective action and cooperatives, and may not be appropriate for other countries or regions. However, as practiced in our study area, it appears to be a viable model for food security and sustainability.  

Eranga Galappaththi* and Fikret Berkes**

Natural Resources Institute

University of Manitoba

Winnipeg, Manitoba

Canada R3T 2N2

* [email protected]  ** [email protected]

Dear Madame/Sir,

We would like to thank HLPE for this study that comprehensively focus on different aspects of fisheries and aquaculture. By this means, outcomes of the report will bring forward the link between the role of fisheries,  aquacualture and food security.

Please find below  the opinions of the Ministry of Food, Agriculture and Livestock of Republic of Turkey on HLPE V0 Draft.

Sincerely Yours

COMMENTS ON THE V0 DRAFT OF THE HLPE REPORT ON THE "ROLE OF SUSTAINABLE FISHERIES AND AQUACULTURE FOR FOOD SECURITY AND NUTRITION":

1. Although it is recognized that fisheries and aquaculture share common issues, owing to structure of activities , resources used and in many other aspects, fisheries and aquaculture should be analyzed separetely.

2. It may be useful to put a new subtitle ‘’Fish Consumption and Food Security’’.

• The reasons of low and high fish consumptions,
• A detail and disaggregated analysis by different factors such as consumption culture, level of income, types of fish, types of fishery products and etc.

3. It may be useful to put a new subtitle ‘‘ Issues threatening the contrubution of fisheries and aquaculture to food security’’ 

• Overexploitation (using of fish meal to feed farmed fish is actually contributing to the overfishing crisis)
• Conflicts of interest (tourism and aquaculture, etc)
• Invasive species
• Pollution
• Etc.

S. Burak GÜRESİNLİ

Assistant EU Expert

Ministry of Food Agriculture and Livestock

Directorate General of EU and Foreign Relations

Department of International Organizations

Eskişehir Yolu 9.Km Lodumlu/Ankara/TÜRKİYE

According to FAO statistics the number of fishworkers worldwide was 27,1 million in 1990 and had increased to 38,3 million in 2010. There are no official statistics available to indicate how many of these are owners or co-owners, independent fishermen working for themselves or salaried fishworkers. There are also very few studies regarding the fishworkers’ legal status under international law or under national laws and regulations (1).

While there have been numerous studies on fishery resources, as well as studies concerning national and international legal frameworks for the management of the resources, there has been an almost complete lack of effort to understand the third dimension of the management of fishery resources: that is to say, the social dimension of fisheries has never been adequately considered by the international organizations dealing with fisheries.  Thus the international measures adopted to protect and manage fishery resources have not been properly understood or agreed on by the fishermen themselves.

The conservation and proper management of resources is extremely important if the already damaged and depleted fish stocks in many areas of the world are to be restored for the benefit of future generations.  To achieve this objective it is unthinkable not to involve fishermen and  fishworkers representative organisations in this process.  Such an involvement is particularly important in relation to IUU fishing which presents the most serious threat to the development of sustainable fisheries.

It is in this context that the social dimension of the management of fishery resources becomes the most important component of any management policies and decisions.  The right to decent work, as defined in ILO’s Convention, 2007 (C188) as well as by COFI and the UN, presents an important and long overdue step in improving the social condition of fishworkers.  The entry into force of the ILO Convention (C188) will also contribute, to some extent, to the eradication of IUU fishing since the majority of fishworkers will not endanger the benefits of decent work by engaging in IUU fishing, which is a criminal act (2).

(1) PescaMed, 2011: PescaMed project Development of cooperation in the Mediterranean Fishery sector: World of labour, Producers’ organizations, consumers’ associations and training – Country reports. Imago Pubblicitasrl – Tricase, Lecce, Italy; 443 pp.

http://www.uilapesca.eu/public/eventi/20121201/imm/pdf/55%20UILA-PESCAMED%202011%20Rapporto.pdf

(2) Uilapesca for Mipaaf, 2012: IUU Fishing and its Relation to the Rights of Fishworkers in International Law, by Seyed Hossein MARASHI & Fabrizio DE PASCALE  http://www.uilapesca.eu/public/eventi/20121201/imm/home.aspx