Annex A
PART I: Demonstration Projects Documents:
Sub-Regional Management of the Spiny Lobster Fisheries Pilot Project
and
Management and Conservation of Reef Biodiversity and Reef Fisheries Pilot Project
for Inclusion into the GEF full siZe project:
Sustainable Management of the Shared Living Marine Resources of the Caribbean Large Marine Ecosystem (CLME) and Adjacent Regions
Pilot Project for Inclusion into the GEF full siZe project:
Sustainable Management of the Shared Living Marine Resources of the Caribbean Large Marine Ecosystem (CLME) and Adjacent Regions
1. Country(s): Bahamas, Belize, Colombia, Costa Rica, Guatemala, Honduras, Jamaica, Nicaragua and Panama
2. Title: Sub-Regional Management of the Spiny Lobster Fisheries Pilot Project
3. Executing Agency: Organization for the Fisheries and Aquaculture Sector of the Central American Isthmus (OSPESCA) through an inter-agency agreement with United Nations Office for Project Services (UNOPS)
4. Cost of Project: GEF: US$1,000,000 Co-Finance: $10,680,505
5. Linkage to Caribbean Large Marine Ecosystem Transboundary Issues
1. The spiny lobster pilot project is linked to two of the CLME priority transboundary issues:
· Unsustainable exploitation of fish and other living resources; and
· Habitat degradation and community modification.
2. The spiny lobster is recognized as one of the six major transboundary fisheries in the CLME and is one of the most economically important for both local as well as national economies. Although as an adult the spiny lobster is restricted to the coastal waters, in the larval planktonic phase it is truly transboundary with the young lobsters being dispersed over wide areas of the Caribbean and distinct lobster stocks are recognized. The sound management of the lobster fisheries at the national and local levels to maintain viable and sustaining breeding populations is therefore crucial and needs to done in a regionally coordinated manner. Lobsters are caught by both small-scale fishers and an industrial fleet, thereby creating many different fishing groups working in different areas and targeting different components of the lobster population. The pilot project will trial various governance models at the national and local levels, linked with wider regional management tools being developed by the FAO WECAF Spiny Lobster working group to set the bases for a robust regional governance framework.
6. Linkage to National Priorities and Programs
3. Lobster fisheries are of major importance for many countries in the region, representing a very high export value, and income and employment for local communities. These countries maintain research programmes on abundance and distribution of the resource, using this information to regulate the size at first catch, closed seasons, berried female protection, and fishing gears and methods regulations. In the case of Colombia, the landings are not as important as in the others countries, but it shares the same stock as Guatemala, Honduras, Jamaica, and Nicaragua, and has management mechanisms for the fishery. Panama has a small fishery but has been involved in the development of local governance programmes in the Kuna Yala territory, supported by the NGO Balu Uala and the Environmental management project for coastal-marine resources in Kuna Yala, which is executed by the Kuna General Congress, with the technical and financial support of the Spanish–Panamanian Mixed Cooperation Fund. Bahamas is the second largest producer in the region and the fishery is of major importance to its relatively small economy. Its lobsters are part of the northern stock rather than south central stock shared by the Central American countries.
4. There is a high degree of cooperation between the countries which has resulted in events such as the meeting held by the Organization for the Fishing and Aquaculture Sector of the Central American Isthmus (OSPESCA) in Managua, Nicaragua in January 2005 entitled the “Regional Alternatives for the Harmonized Administration of the Lobster Fishery in the Caribbean, on the basis of coordinated actions¨. As an outcome of this effort, Nicaragua and Honduras signed an agreement on the harmonization of the closed season, minimum size, a ban on lobster meat exports, the dimension of the escape gap in lobsters’ traps, and other management measures, with the support of delegates from Belize, Costa Rica, Guatemala, Panama, and in the presence of delegates of Bahamas, Colombia and México, and the Latin America Fisheries and Aquaculture Organization (OLDEPESCA). The demonstration project will directly support and enhance these on-going activities.
5. The importance of the lobster fisheries and their management in the Caribbean has been widely recognized by institutions such as the Gulf and Caribbean Fishery Institution (GCFI), FAO WECAFC, Caribbean Regional Fisheries Mechanism (CRFM), Caribbean Fishery Management Council (CFMC), National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). Furthermore, the lobster fishery is significant throughout the Wider Caribbean in that it is regional and transboundary by virtue of planktonic dispersal, whilst local and national in terms of its governance. The fact that it is traded extensively within the region and beyond also calls for a regional approach to management.
7: Name and Post of Government Representatives endorsing the Demonstration Activity
Bahamas
Michael T Braynen, Director, Department of Marine Resources
Belize
James Azueta, Fisheries Officer, Ecosystems Management Unit Coordinator, Belize Fisheries Department
Colombia
Ana Maria Hernandez, Head of the Office for International Affairs, Ministry of Environment, Housing, and Territorial Development
Costa Rica
Jenny Asch Corrales, Coordinator Marine Program, Ministry of Environment and Energy
Guatemala
Luis Ferrate, Minister of Environment and Natural Resources
Honduras
Carlos Hernán García, Director General for Biodiversity, Secretariat for Natural Resources and the Environment
Jamaica
Leonie Barnaby, Senior Director, Environmental Management Division, Ministry of Local Government & Environment, Jamaica
Nicaragua
Roberto Araquistain, Vice-minister, Ministry of Environment and Natural Resources
Panama
Reynaldo Pérez-Guardia, Administrator, Panamanian Authority for Aquatic Resources
8: Project Objectives and Activities
8.1. Background
6. The Caribbean spiny lobster inhabits tropical and subtropical waters of the Atlantic Ocean, Caribbean Sea, and Gulf of Mexico, in a range that goes from Bermuda and North Carolina in the United States, to Rio de Janeiro in Brazil. Lobster fisheries are some of the most valuable in the Western Central Atlantic Fishery Commission (WECAFC) region. Panulirus argus is the most valuable species (Carpenter, 2002) and supports a significant fishery which is considered fully exploited to overexploited in most of the Caribbean countries (FAO 2007). Panulirus guttatus (Latreille, 1804), and Panulirus laevicauda (Latreille, 1817) are also caught in many countries. Between 1992 and 2001, average annual lobster landings in the Caribbean were reported to be 36,827 tonnes, with an estimated value of US$500 million. Around 50,000 lobster fishers are estimated to be active in the area, with an additional 200,000 people working in positions related to the lobster fishery (FAO, 2003). The fishery therefore represents a source of employment and generates incomes to fishers and, in many cases, high export earnings for the countries involved.
7. Sustainable management of lobster fisheries in the Caribbean region is very important for the attainment of national economic and social development goals, as well as for the human well being and livelihoods of individuals and families dependent on these fisheries. The documented decline and in some cases overexploitation of the resource is considered to be a great threat both from the biological as from the socio-economic standpoint. This decline may be in part due to the lack of a fisheries governance regime in which all actors in the fish chain from production and distribution to consumption have input in decisions affecting the resource. Problems facing the sustainable management of the fishery include: open-access nature of the fishery and failure to control fishing effort; large-scale landings of juvenile lobster and berried females; large-scale illegal, unregulated and unreported (IUU) fishing; lack of control and surveillance; lack of harmonization amongst fisheries regulations of the countries involved; insufficient financial resources and human capacity in government institutions; and lack of capacity (organizational, human, financial and technical) among fishers and others involved in the fishery to engage meaningfully in its management. The lack of information throughout the region on landings, effort, IUU fishing, juvenile and berried females also led to inadequate fishery management policies.
8. Lobsters are caught by both small-scale fishers and an industrial fleet, thereby creating many different fishing groups working in different areas and targeting different components of the lobster population. The fishery is one of sequential exploitation in which resource users need to move to new grounds, as the original ones become unprofitable (Grima and Berkes 1989). However, with declining adult stocks, fishermen using small scale traps and diving fish increasingly on the juvenile pre-recruitment stages to avoid moving to new grounds farther offshore or diving deeper. Meanwhile, industrial traps and divers target the spawning adults or those which normally inhabit deeper waters, affecting the spawning stock.
9. Throughout the Central/South America sub-region, the benefits accrued from the fishery varies considerably as lobster catches differ substantially (Table 1). However, in terms of impact of the fishery on the well-being and livelihood of many coastal communities in the region as a whole, the absolute size of the catch can be misleading with communities being near-totally dependent on relatively small but high value catches.
Table1. Landings of spiny lobster from the countries of the Sub-Region Center Central/South America (Kg)Countries / Landings
Bahamas / 3,095,000
Belize (2004) / 278,000
Colombia (2005) / 289,200
Costa Rica (2005) / 34,109
Guatemala (2005) / 83,600
Honduras (2005-06) / 958,780
Jamaica / 460,000
México (Q. Roo 2003) / 416,000
Nicaragua (2005) / 1,269,545
Panamá (2006) / 5,000
Venezuela (2005) / 139,312
10. In 1980, FAO WECAFC initiated a Working Party on spiny lobster management at its Commission meeting in San José Costa Rica,, which included most of the countries in the region with a lobster fishery (WECAF 1982). In 1997 the Working Party was replaced by a WECAFC Ad Hoc Working Group which since has conducted five workshops on the management of this resource: Belize (1997), Merida, Yucatán (1998 and 2000), Cuba (2002) and Mérida (2006). These meetings included major lobster fishing countries with the support of experts to facilitate the analysis of the information.
11. At the 2006 FAO Workshop it was decided to divide the stocks in the Western Central Atlantic into four groups, based on the biogeography and knowledge of the prevailing currents in the region:
· Group I - Northern Stock: Bahamas, Bermuda, Cuba (North), Turks and Caicos Islands and United States of America (Florida).
· Group II - North Central Stock: Belize, Cuba (Southwestern) and Mexico.
· Group III - South Central Stock: Colombia, Costa Rica, Dominican Republic, France (Guadeloupe and Martinique), Haiti, Honduras, Jamaica, Nicaragua, Panama and United States of America (United States Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico).
· Group IV - Southern Stock: Antigua and Barbuda, Brazil, Netherlands Antilles, Saint Lucia and Venezuela.
12. The estimated status of the lobster populations in the countries of the Caribbean region are presented in Table 2. Cuba, Mexico and the United States reported that despite good management and control of the fisheries, the populations in these areas show signs of decline. An additional factor that needs to be considered is that the FAO statistics indicate that annual landings have declined while in the South Central and North Central sub-regions the landings appear to have reached a limit.
Table 2[1]. Estimated Status of the Lobster (Panulirus argus) Fisheries Stock in the Caribbean by country, based on the best available information
Status of the Stock / CountriesSub-exploited / Venezuela (some areas)
Fully exploited or stable / Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands; Turks and Caicos; USA; Mexico; Belize; Costa Rica; Cuba; Antigua and Barbuda; Venezuela (some areas)
Over-exploited / Nicaragua, Jamaica, Dominican Republic, Brazil, Colombia, Honduras
Unknown / Martinique; Guadalupe; Haiti; Bahamas; other countries of the Lesser Antilles
13. A serious problem in the fisheries are the levels of capture of juveniles in countries such as Bahamas, Brazil, Dominican Republic, Honduras, Martinique, Nicaragua, and Turks and Caicos. The magnitude of this problem might be greater than estimated from official samplings of the landings, given the high levels of illegal fishing. The capture of juveniles is an inefficient use of the resource, and, unless it can be carefully controlled, risks damaging the sustainable productive capacity of the population.
14. In most of the countries, mortality from fishing is the leading cause of impacts on the stock. However, it is acknowledged that there are additional factors to the fishing sector that could, in some countries, impact negatively on the stock. These include: growing frequency of hurricanes and tropical storms over the last decade, lobster mortality from harmful algal blooms, and habitat degradation from human activity n the coastal areas resulting in pollution and eutrophication.
15. Even though there are considerable problems to be addressed, some countries in Central America have achieved significant progress in improvements to the evaluation and zoning of their lobster fisheries since the meeting of the ad hoc group on lobster in the WECAF region in Havana, Cuba in 2002. Some countries have actively sought assistance for capacity building for evaluation and management of the fisheries and, in the case of Nicaragua, income obtained from lobster exports has been used to support management of the fishery. :
16. There are serious concerns regarding the conditions under which the lobster divers in some countries work and the health risks that they face. This has resulted in frequent deaths and irreparable damage. It has been reported that in some countries 33% of the lobster divers have had accidents in a single season.
17. There has been considerable effort in the region to assess and address the problems of the lobster fishery by organizations at different jurisdictional levels and at different stages in the policy cycle. Lack of monitoring, control and surveillance is a common problem amongst the countries in the region, resulting in increased fishing effort and large-scale IUU fishing. The large-scale illegal sized lobster catch, which can contribute between 25-50% of the total catch in some countries, is not reported to the national fisheries agencies and can lead to significant bias in estimates of the biomass and the age structure of the stocks. Many governments lack information on the state of exploitation such as the catch per unit of effort (CPUE), the catchability coefficient (q), and, due to the lack of local-level information related to the applied effort, many of the countries cannot estimate maximum sustainable yield (MSY), assess biomass or correctly set annual catch quotas. Failure of adequate control, combined with the high unit value of the species at the global market, has resulted in many conflicts between fishing groups (e.g. small-scale vs. industrial, trappers vs. divers and national vs. international fleets).