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In line with the objectives of the Food and Agriculture Organization’s Project “Sustainable Management of Bycatch in Latin America and Caribbean Trawl Fisheries” (REBYC II LAC), the Fisheries Division of Trinidad and Tobago is applying a participatory GIS approach (pGIS) to support FAO’s  Ecosystem Approach to Fisheries (EAF) in Trinidad’s Gulf of Paria shrimp trawl fisheries. Towards this end, this six-month project included the construction of a preliminary marine habitat, resource and space-use geodatabase, focusing on the Gulf of Paria ecosystem and the bottom-trawl fisheries that take place in this region.

The pGIS initiative involved a preliminary assessment of the fishery and a stakeholder map analysis; a GIS spatial data inventory and needs assessment; and data collection and conversion plans. Technical and geospatial support provided from the Ministry of Agriculture Land and Fisheries (MALF) Fisheries Division and GIS Unit allowed for the collaborative development and population of the marine pGIS geodatabase containing 129 features. The marine geodatabase was leveraged to create a series of twelve composite feature maps highlighting ecological and socio-cultural spatial patterns occurring within the Gulf of Paria ecosystem and underscore space use patterns of the shrimp trawl fishery. The use of pGIS to integrate local spatial knowledge of human use with conventional scientific data resulted in a more comprehensive data product and broader understanding of human-environment interactions occurring within this region.

As recommended next steps for this initiative the management team suggested:

• Defining the application and objectives of the PGIS program
• Addressing data limitations
• Building GIS capacity and training
• Addressing data sharing and access to resources generated

In conclusion, the application of a pGIS approach to support EAF in this demonstration project has been shown to effectively provide a framework for a range of marine and fishing stakeholders to work together to rapidly collect and collate existing national spatial data and information on the Gulf of Paria ecosystem. Multi-sectoral cross-scale collaboration aided the identification and sharing of existing information and the subsequent development of a preliminary marine geodatabase. Data gaps were filled with the use of local knowledge through key informant interviews, mapping exercises and ethnographic surveys. The active participation of both, the Fisheries Department and GIS Unit in all aspects of the Project’s participatory research, mapping and data creation, also served to foster a collaborative working environment and strengthen partnerships between stakeholders. The pGIS approach to support the management of Shrimp Resources and Trawl Fisheries demonstrates how these tools can be applied to understand and plan marine resource management in an ecosystem-based manner, particularly in resource-limited regions such as the Caribbean.