Social Consequences of Excess Fishing Effort

Levels of fishing effort are defined as being excessive where they result in depletion of commercially valuable stocks and so threaten sustainable harvests. In many parts of Southeast Asia, this threat has been realized by the rapid expansion of commercial fisheries and the consequent increase in fishing effort. Southeast Asian fisheries are described as having a dualistic structure with distinct small-scale and large-scale subsectors. Competition and conflict between these subsectors is widespread and exacerbates the negative social consequences of excessive fishing effort. These include dissipation of resource rents, gear conflicts leading to broader social conflict, increased use of destructive fishing techniques, changes in the food supply and distribution channels (with disproportionate negative effects on rural populations), and increased concentration of economic power within the fisheries sector. Further, excessive fishing effort reduces incomes and standards of living for the majority of fishermen and undermines communitybased distributive and resource management mechanisms. The fundamental problems of fisheries management are inherently political, entailing issues of resource allocation and distributive equity. These problems are complicated by the role of fisheries as a social safety valve for the landless and the unemployed. As such, fisheries managment cannot be divorced from broader problems of Southeast Asian nations and are only solvdble within this larger context.