View the complete CCRN’s Halifax Community Story as a PDF

Sadie Beaton, Miranda Cobb, Will Fawcett-Hill, Marla MacLeod, Laura Mather, Tiffanie Rainville, and Satya Ramen

Key messages

• Collective action in an unsustainable social-ecological system can catalyse a shift towards increased community sustainability when supported with financial resources and appropriate local institutions.

• Cross-cultural knowledge sharing and place-based learning are integral to transforming social-ecological systems at the community level.

• Social innovation can lead to transformation when supported by a network of collaborative organisations with a shared set of principles and a united vision to inspire change.

Community profile 

Figure 1: Map of Select Community Gardens in Halifax

Many communities in Nova Scotia rely on food from large chain grocery stores and discount stores year-round. As a secondary source, and seasonally dependent, there are an increasing number of Farmers’ Markets across the province. However, there are several communities in which grocery stores are physically far away, creating a situation where people rely on what’s available at small convenience stores such as those associated with many petrol stations. These stores typically offer prepared, packaged and convenience foods that tend to be high in sugar, salt and fat, and many do not have facilities to offer fresh foods. This exacerbates economic and social inequalities.

Like the rest of North America, the diet of many Nova Scotians features processed and convenience meals, with trends away from whole foods or home cooked meals. However, there is a strong history of growing and preserving livestock and produce in NS, which has been resurging through the food movement over the past decade.

Conservation and livelihood challenges

Unfortunately, several rural and urban Nova Scotian communities face issues with accessing healthy and sustainable foods. The rate of food insecurity in Nova Scotia is the third highest in Canada at 15.4%^(7,4).

Community initiatives

Since the early 2000s, community-based organizations have been taking a closer look at local food systems and working to improve access to healthy, sustainable food. This community story describes the work of four community groups in Nova Scotia’s capital city, Halifax, towards developing positive food environments: i) the Bayers Westwood Family Resource Centre (BWFRC), ii) the Immigrant Settlement Association of Nova Scotia (ISANS), iii) Mulgrave Park gardens and iv) Common Roots’ Urban Farm (CRUF). These groups are linked through their close relationship with the Ecology Action Centre (EAC), an environmental NGO that has been one of the first in Atlantic Canada to begin connecting food systems and environmental issues.

Bayers-Westwood
The Bayers-Westwood community, of Halifax’s West End, is very diverse, consisting of 358 families, including 60% newcomers. These are mostly single parent families, with many living on disability and income assistance. As one community member described, “The food environment is very challenging. There is never enough food, the food bank runs out, and there are hardly any fruit and vegetables available.”

Figure 2: Community Garden at Bayers-Westwood

Since their partnership with EAC, the community garden infrastructure and leadership has grown significantly. Bayers Westwood Family Resource Centre hired a seasonal garden coordinator, implemented a percentage of staff time toward food and garden programs, and established core volunteer roles for the ongoing maintenance and coordination of the garden. As a result, they now have capacity to grow more produce for initiatives like local pop-up markets, making their own garden preserves, and increase garden membership. According to the centre, factors supporting healthy food access include growing space, knowledge and skill, and social support.

ISANS: Glen Forest & Multicultural Community Gardens
ISANS is a community organization that welcomes immigrants to Nova Scotia, offering services and creating opportunities for immigrants to participate in Canadian life. In 2012, ISANS started their first two community gardens; the Glen Forest Garden, followed by the Multicultural Community Garden in 2013. Although vandalism put the gardens at risk, engagement with the EAC has increased the capacity to effectively run the gardens. Community members emphasized the need for social support, indicating a connection between social coordination and food access, such as through the ability to organise seed swaps, bulk food orders and intergenerational language exchanges.

Garden participants often lack basic social supports that affect their well-being, including their mental health and livelihood outcomes. As one participant put it, “In my ideal world… I don’t have to make a decision between chicken and detergent.” As another describes, “I feel better about myself when I am able to buy necessities.”

Mulgrave Park

Mulgrave Park is a vibrant public housing neighbourhood with a rich history, comprised of primarily of African-Nova Scotians, in the north end of Halifax, home to over 250 families. Progress in the park is a community development initiative that seeks to empower the residents through entrepreneurial action that inspires inclusiveness and challenges stigma. One major focus of the initiative is food security, including community gardens. The community has developed 12 accessible raised beds, which were built to address the needs of residents living beside the garden. Due to the multiple intersecting social and economic barriers experienced by the majority of the residents, community members were hesitant to invest in the gardening project. However, the children’s programme, ‘Plants- to-Plates’, was incredibly successful at engaging youth, and many days during the summer kids can be found playing and working in the garden. As a result, 70% of youth involved reported eating more vegetables because of the garden programme which led parents to become more open to the project. One parent had this to say about their children: “They love to help me at the garden, they enjoy watering, and enjoy the veggies that I have ready. :)” and “I have the veggies at the garden so I don’t need to buy. Just pick-up and enjoy and most important, no chemicals!”.

Figure 3: The HUGS Community Garden in Bayers-Westwood.

Common Roots:

Common Roots Urban Farm (CRUF) is a community garden in Halifax, building “a community-built vision of urban agriculture and productive landscapes” (Food Secure Canada, 2014), and along with over 100 individual and community plots, is made up of a market garden, edible landscaping, and places to sit and relax or learn and work together. Unlike the other gardens, Common Roots has a large volunteer capacity and the majority of participants enjoy a mid-range income. Common Roots also engages with newcomers and immigrants, many of who are living on assistance. Through programmes like Deep Roots, they invite newcomers to volunteer on the farm and employ their extensive farming skills in a new climate. In 2017, the first employee hired there came from the Deep Roots programme.

Practical Outcomes

There are, of course, challenges to be met. For example, the ISANS community found that access is also allayed by the availability of culturally appropriate food – that is, food that residents would customarily eat – but food banks don’t often serve culturally appropriate food (or familiar foods). Participants also spoke of lacking skills/knowledge on preparing the different foods. Language and literacy impacted peoples’ ability to buy at the grocery store, and community garden members commented on a lack of transparency in the food system, and an inability to “know what food has chemicals, what is organic, and what is not going to cause harm.”

Government Policy
The policy context for gardens on municipal land in the Halifax region is positive. For example, the proposed Centre Plan for Halifax allows and encourages urban agriculture. There is an Administrative Order within the Halifax Regional Municipality that allows community gardens on municipal land to sell their produce and reinvest the revenue in the garden (i.e. soil). Community development and recreation staff with the municipality may help gardens become established, helping them with the municipality’s application process and facilitating in-kind access to on-site infrastructure such as water or electricity.

Ultimately, food is a topic that connects all of us. Community garden projects and food skills workshops have proven to be great entry points to increased awareness and engagement with food issues. Community food programs are tangible and accessible; they build skills, and enhance a sense of agency alongside social and community connections. “Positive food environments” can also become points of resistance, as community members feel empowered to challenge the status quo⁽¹⁰⁾. Without a doubt, vulnerable populations experience multiple types of marginalisation related to complex power dynamics that create barriers to agency and food security.

Considering a variety of perspectives is beneficial when addressing complex social problems like food security, whether coming from the lens of health, environment, social justice, or even cultural celebration. There is value in linking communities together to explore some of the diverse elements of food security work in an integrated approach, recognising food production as just one variable in a much larger complex system.

This approach has fostered the development and integration of community food programming within various Nova Scotian communities. It has also enabled new cross-sectoral collaborations to emerge, that help address gaps in access to and availability of healthy foods within a more localised food system.

References

Acknowledgements 

Funding for this work was provided by the Public Health Agency of Canada (Innovation Strategy).

View the complete CCRN’s São Luiz Community Story as a PDF

Camila A. Islas, Alice R. de Moraes, Juliana S. African & Cristiana S. Seixas

Key Messages

• Severe land degradation and environmental disasters can act as triggers to new community conservation and development initiatives and as stimulus to existing ones.
• Bridging organizations can foster community initiatives through projects addressing environmental conservation and restoration in parallel to local capacity building and community development.
• Cultural identity plays a central role in engaging communities in projects of nature conservation.

Community Profile

São Luiz do Paraitinga (hereafter São Luiz) is a municipality with about 10,000 inhabitants, located in Eastern São Paulo State of Brazil, near the Atlantic coast (Figure 1). The municipality is situated within the Paraíba Valley, which links the two largest metropolitan areas in Brazil (São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro). Out of the ~730 km² of the municipality’s area, 10% are encompassed by Serra do Mar State Park, a protected area, and 13% are in its buffer zone. The main land uses/cover are pasture (53%) and fragmented forests (37%), while cattle breeding for dairy, forestry and agriculture are the main economic activities⁽²⁾. The municipality is also embedded in the Atlantic Forest biome – a hotspot for biodiversity conservation, i.e. one of the highly threatened biomes in the world⁽⁵⁾.

Figure 1. A) The State of São Paulo highlighted in the Brazilian map. B) São Luíz do Paraitinga Municipality highlighted in the State of São Paulo map.

The landscape of São Luiz has been shaped by specific material and immaterial cultural features that were strongly influenced by coffee plantations from the early 20^th century and by the Caipira way of life, a local designation to a rural livelihood which involves typical food, music, tales, dances and festivities (see Figure 2).

The city’s architectural ensemble is the largest historical collection of the State’s architectural heritage, and its population proudly keeps alive several displays of immaterial culture⁽³⁾. The local economy currently depends on public services, and the Human Development Index (HDI = 0.690) is among the lowest of the State’s municipalities. In this context, cultural tourism and eco-tourism are promising alternatives for economic development.

Rural communities in Brazil are important SES, specifically in south-eastern states such as São Paulo, where landscapes are highly fragmented and urbanised. Landscapes there sometimes have patches of native vegetation that are especially important to wild animals, serving as habitat and ‘stepping-stones’, which generate various ecosystem services and are also home to human communities and their livelihoods⁽³⁾. The vast majority of rural properties (96%) in the municipality of São Liuz are owned by smallholders⁽²⁾.

In this context lies Catuçaba, a rural district in São Luiz comprising a village with around 1,000 inhabitants and its surrounding rural neighbourhoods. Most inhabitants make their living from small-scale animal husbandry and other smallholding activities⁽³⁾.

Figure 2: Traditional dance presentation at the central square, in front of the main church, during the festivity of the Holy Spirit in São Luiz do Paraitinga, 2016.

Until a few decades ago, the village was partially isolated from the urban center due to poor road access. However, the road connecting the village to downtown was paved by the year 2000, facilitating outsiders’ access and products transportation, and improving the access of villagers and rural inhabitants to infrastructure, education and health. Tourism-related activities have been modestly flourishing in the territory, supported by its beautiful landscape, pleasant climate and historical farms.

Conservation and Livelihood Challenges

Land degradation is longstanding in the region. Agriculture has been practiced since the settlement of the first colonisers in the late 17^th century, in spite of the hilly landscape and low nutrient availability and permeability of the soil⁽²⁾. Economic cycles (cotton, coffee, agriculture and cattle), along with poor soil management techniques, contributed to land degradation, impoverishing the soil, and most recently covering the land with Brachiaria, an invasive exotic grass that feeds the cattle and worsens soil permeability. As a result, cattle productivity has declined and many landowners fell back on other activities to complete their income.

Meanwhile, due to the promises of better job and education opportunities in urban centres, rural out-migration hampered the availability of rural workers and lowered social cohesion. Currently, land degradation in such social context threaten most of the traditional livelihoods.

On January 1st, 2010, São Luiz suffered from a flood of great magnitude, when the river crossing the downtown area raised over 11 meters above its regular level in a matter of hours, largely damaging the historical buildings and affecting the whole population, both urban and rural. Fortunately, there were no fatalities. Other than the high precipitation registered in end-2009, this flood was caused by factors linked to land degradation in rural areas, such as soil compaction in degraded and poorly managed pastures, fires commonly used to clear land, scarcity of forests near watercourses, and human occupation of floodplains.

Community Initiatives^*

In the face of the disaster’s intensity and tremendous material losses, the population of São Luiz showed a remarkable capacity to self-organize in order to cope with the emergency situation and, later, to rebuild and restore the functioning of the city⁽⁵⁾. Since the floods, the territory as a whole has been targeted by diverse projects focusing on forest restoration, agro-ecological production and capacity building.

The 2010 disaster stimulated new and ongoing community initiatives, mostly with the help of local and regional NGOs and government organizations. During the post-disaster reorganization phase, the community actively participated in decisions regarding the reconstruction of historical buildings and other issues. In addition to engineering work conducted at the government initiative, most post-disaster initiatives focused on keeping the vibrancy of local cultural manifestations⁽⁵⁾.

Figure 3: The scenic landscape around Catuçaba district: degraded pastures and patches of biodiversity-rich Atlantic forest covering its hills and valleys.

The community also showed a remarkable sense of place and attachment to both São Luiz, similarly to Catuçaba and its surrounding area (Figure 3). The tragedy seems to have reinforced this sense of place and local people’s capacities of coping and recovering their community life with their own hands, and at the same time acknowledging and being grateful for all the solidarity and help they received from external people and institutions⁽⁵⁾.

One of these community initiatives working to improve conservation and livelihoods was the Comunidade da Vila (Village Community). In 2012, the Learning Community initiative began in Catuçaba. The main goal of the project was to promote an environment for reflection about nature conservation and local development, and to facilitate the planning of collective actions^(1,3). Together with local people, the initiative planned and organised several cultural events and community actions over three years⁽¹⁾. Although the project ended in 2015, the community continued to meet until 2017, focusing on a street market with local products, tourism-related activities and festivities ^(3).

A local NGO, Akarui, has been developing projects for nature conservation integrated with socio-economic development in the region since 2003. After the 2010 flood, their prominence increased as Akarui members’ attachment to and knowledge about the territory, in addition to their technical expertise, led efforts to sustainable development of rural areas of the municipality. Akarui has carried out projects regarding socio-environmental characterisation, forest restoration, agro-ecological transition, pasture management and improvement of farmers’ income. The NGO is still working in the territory, currently expanding their initiatives to encompass environmental education and food security and sovereignty.

After the extreme events of 2010 (flood) and 2013/2014 (severe drought), more community members got interested in taking part in restoration projects, and a growing number are willing to adopt agro-ecological principles to their production chain. An Agenda 21 plan, built through participatory methods for the watershed, including guidelines for its sustainable development, is a featured product of Akuri. The NGO acknowledges rural communities as their main partners⁽²⁾.

Finally, another initiative named Rede para o Desenvolvimento Sustentável do Alto Paraíba (Upper Paraíba River Sustainable Development Network), or REDESUAPA, began their work after the 2010 floods. The network encompasses diverse stakeholders including local leaders, local and state government, local and regional NGOs and researchers, who met voluntarily in the municipality. In addition to project development, REDESUAPA created synergies among ongoing efforts and aimed at influencing public policy based on a systemic view of the territory, promoting ecological restoration, sustainable farming and community-based tourism. For instance, in 2016, REDESUAPA wrote an open letter addressed to the candidates running for Mayor asking for their commitment to priority guidelines for urban and rural sustainable development in the municipality. The network played a key role in the efforts to bring investments of a big project to the region, which is funded by the Global Environment Facility (GEF). The Recovery and protection of climate and biodiversity services in the Paraíba do Sul Basin of the Atlantic Forest of Brazil project is based on Payments for Environmental Services (PES) and other incentives for sustainable land management and conservation in private lands. The members of REDESUAPA are still in touch with each other, but the network itself is on ‘standby mode’. However, the synergies created by REDESUAPA are reflected in a number of other initiatives concerning local development, conservation and ecological restoration.

^*The data and analysis on the social-ecological system of São Luiz and Catuçaba refer to the period 2012-2017. The authors acknowledge that changes have occurred in the system since then. Although they are not analysed here, we have added some information about the current situation, based on non-systematic observation.

Practical Outcomes

The development of initiatives is neither easy nor fast, but they have certainly been flourishing and creating arenas for community learning, empowerment, and development in São Luiz do Paraitinga (including Catuçaba). Although the 2010 flood was an important trigger to various initiatives, it is still unclear how successful they will be in terms of self-maintenance and mitigating the risk of floods in the future.

These bottom-up initiatives have valorized rural livelihoods and fostered opportunities for people to remain in rural areas. Inhabitants have been self-organizing to strengthen the Caipira identity, preserve local traditions (e.g., festivities and foods), and promote local development, with an overall understanding that their good quality of life depends on nature conservation⁽³⁾. Small, low-cost initiatives triggered improvements in the community capacity to organize and act collectively for a common goal⁽⁴⁾, although leadership and broader participation of community members in such initiatives remains a challenge.

Bridging organizations, such as NGOs and university teams, play a crucial role in linking local stakeholders with one another and with outside institutions (i.e. State Environmental authorities and funding agencies), facilitating learning opportunities, fundraising and providing access to technical advisory⁽¹⁾. In the course of creating environments where diverse local and outside stakeholders can interact and collaborate (Figure 4), the initiatives have generated a feedback loop, which is attracting more and more initiatives.

Figure 4: Caipira meeting in January 2017, where members of Catuçaba community and their external supporters discussed local development, nature and culture.

Until 2017, several stakeholders were joining efforts to work synergistically, for instance through REDESUAPA, to positively transform the region’s landscape at the watershed level. The efforts were benefitting from both bottom-up and top-down initiatives, taking into account both local knowledge and technical/scientific expertise, and involving stakeholders with different levels of political power. Above all, these efforts involve a diverse array of individuals who believe in a more sustainable and just society, and struggle year after year to accomplish their vision.

In face of socio-ecological change over the last decade, various community initiatives towards conservation and social development have emerged in São Luiz do Paraitinga^{(3, 4)}. Many tourism-related activities have been developing, especially those regarding ecotourism (e.g., farm hotels and rafting) and cultural tourism (e.g., religious, art and local food festivities). More recently, other community initiatives were established as local markets of agro-ecological products and craft fairs. After the 2010 floods, the municipality drew the attention of many governmental and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) favouring the emergence of new environmental and social initiatives. The success of these initiatives has depended on population engagement and participation, as well as aligning to local demands and inherent dynamics of the local SES. The question ahead may be if and how these initiatives will thrive or perish in the long term, and which factors will determine their course.

References

Acknowledgements

We thank the population of São Luiz do Paraitinga and, in particular, of Catuçaba community, the NGO Akarui, and REDESUAPA for their commitment and availability for our projects. We also thank SSHRC/CCRN, CAPES, CNPq, PREAC/UNICAMP and FAPESP for funding. The project also received a strong support from our entire CGCommons Team (The Commons Conservation and Management group at University of Campinas, Brazil).

View the complete CCRN’s Koh Sralao Community Story as a PDF

Furqan Asif, Jason Horlings and Melissa Marschke

Key Messages

• The Koh Sralao community work together to safeguard their mangrove forests which form a critical link to their livelihood.
• Community activism concerning coastal resource management issues and resistance to sand dredging contributed to the termination of nearby dredging activities.
• The development of a Special Economic Zone in the provincial capital has provided valuable economic opportunities for young women, contributing to livelihood diversification.

 Community Profile

Figure 1: Map showing select fishing villages including Koh Sralao (bottom right) in relation to Koh Kong town and the SEZ. Map: Google (modified by Furqan Asif).

Koh Sralao is a small 300 household mangrove-estuarine fishing village on the southwestern coast of Cambodia (Figure 1), approximately 22 km from the provincial capital Koh Kong. The village is accessible only by boat. Given the remote nature of the community, most goods and products need to be shipped in and out.

Villagers rely heavily on the marine environment, with fish making up the bulk of their dietary protein. The local marine resources have been the source of sustenance and livelihood for many decades. Although the main activity is crab fishing, a diversity of fishing activities are found, including green mussel culture, shrimp and grouper fishing⁽⁶⁾.

Local fishers use mechanized boats and gill nets or crab traps to harvest the marine resources in and around the mangrove estuarine area, or within a few kilometers of the coastline.  Households work together, with men (sometimes with their wives) going out to fish daily or spending a few days on their boats and women sorting,  processing  and  selling  aquatic   products to   a   handful   of  local  traders  (aquatic  products typically go to the provincial town, and then may move to Cambodia’s capital or into Thailand).

However, sustaining a small-scale fisheries livelihood is challenging⁽⁵⁾ and livelihoods have diversified within and beyond the village. For example, households may have family members working (temporarily or permanently) in construction or factory jobs.  While this work has typically been in another province, in Cambodia’s capital or in Thailand, there are now wage-labour opportunities particularly for young women in the provincial capital at the Special Economic Zone (SEZ), near the border with Thailand.

Conservation and Livelihood Challenges

Declining fish populations

Figure 2: The sun sets on houses at Koh Sralao coastal fishing village in Cambodia (Photo: Furqan Asif)

Fishers have spoken about fish declines for decades⁽⁵⁾ and continue to be concerned about fish stocks. The observations made by Koh Sralao fishers are consistent with statistics for the Gulf of Thailand which shows a dramatic decrease in catch per unit effort (an indirect measure of fish abundance) over the past decades.

The declines observed in Koh Sralao‘s aquatic resources may be due to a number of different factors. Fishers have observed an increase in foreign fishing vessels in the nearshore area. Thai fishing vessels may have moved into Cambodian waters as a result of Thailand’s fisheries reform⁽⁹⁾.  Fishers also talk about the impacts of climate change on aquatic resources.  Although the direct effects of climate change on fisheries in Koh Sralao are not yet clear, it seems that rains are less predictable, and storms may be more frequent. Ocean warming may be impacting fish migration routes and reproduction⁽⁸⁾.

Sand dredging

In addition to the persistent decline in catch, sand dredging, which began in the Koh Sralao area in late 2007, has had an impact on the aquatic resources surrounding the Koh Sralao community (Figure 3). The short term impacts of this dredging are clear⁽⁵⁾:

• Fish habitat is being destroyed. Dredging deepens shallow channels, impacting fish and other aquatic habitat in the process.
• Fish migration routes are being disturbed, and the water is said to be more turbid.
• Boats have been dredging near the edge of the mangroves, partially damaging some trees and completely ripping out others.

Community Initiatives

Koh Sralao is a village with a history of community organization around resource management⁽⁵⁾. This means that villagers have been able to organize formally but also use informal channels to express their concerns.

Figure 3. A barge carrying sand from sand mining operations in Koh Kong (Photo: Furqan Asif)

Sand dredging

Villagers have been concerned about the sand dredging since it began in 2007, and have been involved in protests, public consultations and meetings with sand dredgers.  At one point the sand dredging came within eyesight of Koh Sralao, which mobilized villagers yet again. The Koh Sralao community has received support from NGOs, including an activist NGO that initiated an anti-sand mining campaign in 2015.

Mangrove conservation

The Koh Sralao community has worked together to safeguard their natural environment. They have become aware of the importance of conserving the mangrove forests that form a critical link to their livelihood. For example, annual mangrove replanting has become a community tradition since the late 1990s. The area is known for its mangroves which span 23,750 hectares in a protected area and features an ecotourism site set up near the Peam Krasop community.

Livelihood diversification

Households have responded to marine resource degradation by shifting livelihood activities within and beyond the village, with regional factory wage work emerging as another diversification strategy.  It is predominantly young women in Koh Sralao that go to work at the Koh Kong SEZ located near the provincial town, since SEZ factories mainly hire women between the ages of 18 to 25⁽⁷⁾.  However, there is no maternity leave for women, and it is difficult for them to return to the SEZ after the age of 28.  Thus, while young women are gaining more opportunities beyond the fishing village, such gains are time-sensitive, and it is unclear how many young women may return to the village at another point in their lives.

Practical Outcomes

Sand dredging

One of the outcomes of the initial protests to the sand dredging was that the dredging activities moved to another area, out of sight of Koh Sralao. Even so, the community wanted the activity to stop altogether, since the negative impacts of the sand dredging continued to be felt. Community members worked with a local activist NGO, providing interviews to media and spearheading a social media campaign, to share the impacts of a decade of continuous sand mining on coastal livelihoods. In November 2016, the Ministry of Mines and Energy announced that they had halted sand dredging operations in Koh Kong, with a total ban on coastal sand dredging for export emerging in mid-2017⁽⁴⁾.

The ban on sand dredging is certainly welcome news to the villagers and for the conservation of the mangrove ecosystem. More broadly, this story not only highlights the challenges of natural resource-based livelihoods and the pressures that coastal communities face (shaped by socio-economic and political forces), but also the importance and impact of grassroots community activism for coastal ecological conservation.

Livelihood diversification

Local factory labour opportunities continue to provide a higher, more consistent income than would otherwise be the case for most young women in Koh Sralao. Women are sending remittances home, and for these households this is an additional source of income (even if time sensitive), all the more important given the challenge of small-scale fisheries livelihoods ⁽³⁾.  The longer term implications of such wage work, in the sense of helping to sustain coastal livelihoods and villagers’ well-being, remains to be seen.

References

Acknowledgements

Community Conservation Research Network

Saint Mary’s University

Halifax, Nova Scotia

B3H 3C3 Canada

Phone: 902.420.5003

E-mail: ccrn@smu.ca

View the complete CCRN’s Bolivia’s Northern Amazon Community Story as a PDF

Alison Macnaughton

Key Messages

• Introduced fish species in the Bolivian Amazon could provide Indigenous communities with livelihood opportunities, but may also be a threat to their critically-important subsistence fisheries through predation and territorial exclusion.

• Local fishery organizations can be strengthed through ongoing dialogue, leadership training, and technical assistance.

• Engaging with local, regional and national level actors and promoting open spaces of dialogue (workshops, round table groups) can help identify common interests, resolve conflicts and support discussion on future planning.

Community Profile

Figure 1: Map of Bolivia showing the Pando and Beni departments(10)

Conservation and Livelihood Challenges

Figure 2: Traditional houses in Baketi community, TCO Cavineño, 2015), and low returns to producers.

Community Initiatives

Since 2011, indigenous communities have worked with researchers from the Asociación Faunagua, World Fisheries Trust, and the University of Victoria (Canada), to better understand the fisheries situation, and identify pathways to improve livelihood and food security in the region.

Figure 3: Explaining local fishing areas, catch and effort, community workshop, TCO Chácobo, 2015

Much of this work has focused on the paiche; providing key information on abundance and impacts, as well as potential for development. So far, these efforts have provided important information on:

• Nutritional status and food security of rural and urban populations and key determinants, including the contributions of fish⁽¹⁾;
• Fisheries and other livelihood activities, and local perspectives about paiche; and
• Fishery value chains, and mechanisms to improve transparency and promote greater economic equity between fishers, middlemen and markets^(7,5)

Figure 4: Mapping the spread of the introduced paiche fish, community workshop, TCO Chácobo 2015

There have also been a range of practical initiatives including:

• Pilot initiatives for value-added fish production, for example the establishment of a cooperative in one of the indigenous communities, where paiche fillets and skins (for leather production) are produced and sold at improved prices;
• Strengthening local fisheries organizations through ongoing dialogue, leadership training, and providing technical assistance, e.g. consolidation of the regional fishers association; and
• Engaging with local, regional and national level actors and promoting open spaces of dialogue (workshops, round table groups) to identify common interests, resolve conflicts and discuss future planning^(8).

Practical Outcomes

Figure 5: Preparing roasted tucunaré (peacock bass), a traditional dish, TCO Cavineño, 2015

• Capacity-building for communities and local organisations to identify and articulate local needs and priorities for development and conservation.
• Development and implementation of resource management plans and other governance tools at a local level.
• More effective engagement in regional planning.
• Support for greater transparency, communication and cooperation between agencies responsible for regulating fishing and fish markets.
• Improving returns to fishers, for example through value-added opportunities or improved pricing structure.

Figure 6: Returning with the day’s catch, TCO Cavineño, 2015

References

Acknowledgements

View the CCRN’s Eastern Shore Community Story as a PDF

Tiffanie Rainville, Sadie Beaton, Jennifer Graham, Maggy Burns
Ecology Action Centre; Sadie.beaton@gmail.com

Key Messages

• A close relationship with the land is a key aspect of   local identities along the Eastern Shore of Nova Scotia.
• Local community groups have been key actors in the Eastern Shore’s forestry and wilderness conversation
• These same actors are also looking to innovative combinations of new and old technologies for new ways to protect the Eastern Shore identity, including eco-tourism and adventure tourism.

Community Introduction

Within the eastern Canadian province of Nova Scotia, the Eastern Shore is a largely rural region of the mainland, northeast of Halifax along the Atlantic Ocean coast (Figure 1 – Map). Human habitation of the region goes back several thousand years. Mi’kmaq peoples traditionally thrived throughout Mi’kma’ki, a territory encompassing Canada’s Maritime Provinces and Gaspé Peninsula of Quebec. The Mi’kmaq traditionally hunted, fished, and camped in the region. Before European contact, Mi’kmaq populations were distributed throughout the Eastern Shore region, with concentrations nearby present day Musquodoboit, Ship Harbour and Sheet Harbour. Although Mi’kmaq retained their traditional land use patterns in these early years of contact, significant changes occurred with the arrival of English and German Protestants, who were granted tracts of land by their colonizing nations. As a result, Mi’kmaq populations were largely displaced,

Figure 1: Eastern Shore, NS. Credit: BBCanada.com

By the early 1900s, a number of fish plants, shipyards, lumber mills and gold mines helped usher this sparsely settled region into the industrial revolution. Industrialization intensified a boom-and-bust economy, temporarily increasing the population base – until many of these operations closed down in the 1990s with the impactful historical collapse of the groundfish fisheries3.

As the local forestry industry began to be increasingly managed for pulp, due to a global appetite for paper made from wood pulp, forest management practices shifted towards clearcutting. In 1977, the provincial government opted for a forestry policy aiming to double harvesting volume and, by the 1980s, clearcutting was the overwhelming norm. Increasingly mechanized harvesting technologies further accelerated the degradation of the Eastern Shore forest. These shifts in technology, markets, and policy not only degraded the forests, but also led to loss of community access to the land, and phased out most forest management roles from the community. However, recent international drivers, stemming from the United Nations’ Brundtland Report (1987) and Rio Declaration (1992) drove federal and provincial wilderness protection commitments starting in the 1990s. The Eastern Shore is home to the Acadian forest (Figure 2), a unique woodland that extends across eastern Canadian and the northeastern United States. This resilient forest ecosystem, listed as endangered by the World Wildlife Fund, is comprised of a mixture of uneven-aged hardwood and softwood trees.

Figure 2: Acadian Forest. Credit: Jamie Simpson

Eastern Shore forests have value to both local residents and the wider population as plant and animal habitat, carbon storage, storm protection, and soil preservation, along with recreational opportunities (hunting and fishing, canoeing, and camping) and other trail system activities. Access to this wilderness is valuable for economic, recreational, aesthetic and spiritual reasons. Some areas, notably the archipelago of small islands that dot the coastline, have both wilderness protection and ecotourism potential. Nova Scotia forests and their services in climate regulation, waste treatment, recreation and cultural benefits, among others, have been estimated to contribute up to $1.68 billion (1997$) annually1 and help reduce climate change damage, through storing 107 million tonnes of carbon2.

The largely rural population of 15,720 (2011) continue to pursue mixed livelihoods, with an economy based primarily on fishing, forestry, but also including some hunting (and guiding), and salmon angling. A close relationship with the land is a key aspect of local identities along the Eastern Shore and land access is critical to this deep connection, and highly valued.

Conservation and Livelihood Challenges

In Nova Scotia, the province’s Department of Natural Resources (DNR) manages most of the publicly owned forest and wilderness resources. DNR has broad responsibilities related to the development, management, conservation and protection of forests, minerals, parks and wildlife resources. Despite this, environmental and community groups believe that DNR’s relationships with forest extraction companies has dominated DNR’s motivations, often leading to management choices that diminish Nova Scotia’s natural wealth.

Much of the Acadian forest along the Eastern Shore has been logged extensively, and even-aged forest monoculture stands (same aged trees with little to no mixture of younger and older trees) have diminished its resiliency. This has impacted the Eastern Shore, as did the stunning collapse of groundfish stocks in the early 1990s, which not only resulted in significant ecological loss, but also decreased economic resiliency, driving rural depopulation. Many have speculated that there was an accompanying collapse in the sense of rural coastal identity.

The aging population of the Eastern Shore is an equally important point. In recent decades, the number of school-aged children has reduced dramatically, as many of the 30 and 40 year olds have left the region for work elsewhere. This has important implications for the Eastern Shore’s economy, which hasn’t been robust in decades.

Livelihood pressures and waves of outmigration have fragmented the population structure and identity of the Eastern Shore. Populations closer to the city are growing, shifting community identity, including the meaning of “rural”. Once defined by direct natural resource use, these towns are becoming “bedroom” communities of Halifax. A reverse influx of “new” community members, who have settled in the region over the past few decades, have also helped spur collective action around protecting watersheds, wildlife habitat and preserving Acadian forests. However, overlapping priorities have conflicted with the stewardship and access issues of the more long-time residents.

Community Initiative

The socio-ecological system of the Eastern Shore is extremely rich, encompassing a variety of relevant stories and lessons. The research in this region focuses on community conservation actions related to forestry and wilderness conservation between 1975 and 2015. The story illustrates how the efforts of key local champions helped drive an evolution of community identity over time, allowing for increased collective action related to protection both of wilderness and local livelihoods.

Various community groups have been key local actors in the Eastern Shore forestry and wilderness conversation. These groups include: The Association for the Preservation of the Eastern Shore (APES); The Eastern Shore Forest Watch Association (ESFWA); Otter Ponds Demonstration Forest; The Deanery; The Public Lands Coalition (PLC); and The Ecology Action Centre (EAC). Local actors or ‘local champions’ within the above groups were crucial drivers of change in this story, facilitating collaborations amongst diverse stakeholders to achieve transformative outcomes. Also, individuals brought together groups, which then amplified their organization, enabling them to take up greater roles as activists promoting (and accomplishing) conservation outcomes.

Background: 1970s-2000s
In 1975, Parks Canada aimed to designate a large area of the Eastern Shore as a National Park. Local communities expressed immediate concern about protecting their access to the land, preserving their way of life, and the threat of expropriation of their land. The APES formed, mobilizing collective action around the expropriation threat. After significant local pushback, the Federal government backed off. Subsequently, the provincial government has negotiated and established provincial parks and sanctuaries, especially along the coast. The National Park proposal marked the beginning of decades of changes shaped by divergent stakeholder interests around local resources, especially forests.

After the Nova Scotia government selected 31 Wilderness Areas for protection in 1990, Jim Campbell’s Barren, in Nova Scotia’s Cape Breton area, was dropped from the list of candidates in 1996. This key event led to public opposition (led by the Public Lands Coalition) and demand for the re-inclusion of Jim Campbell’s Barren. By 1998, the dropped candidate area was returned to the list, and momentum from this “win” led to a push for larger pieces of protected land at the provincial level. This fostered a sense of agency and empowerment on the Eastern Shore, even though not all residents agreed with the outcomes.

By the year 2000, a collective opinion emerged among local stakeholders across Nova Scotia, that the “industrial forestry model was not compatible with local use”. This is arguably the moment when local groups crossed a threshold into a more concerted “identity” and capacity to influence change as a coherent group.

During a subsequent Forest Forum event, participants called for a “change in vision”. This change in vision evolved into what became known as the Colin Stewart Forest Forum (CSFF), which served as a mechanism for negotiation between forestry companies and the Public Lands Coalition, without active involvement from the DNR. The CSFF quickly evolved and agreed to produce a report delineating sites for protection, with recommendations for meeting Nova Scotia’s declared goal of landmass protection, as outlined in the Environmental Goals and Sustainable Prosperity Act (2007). Submitted in 2009, the report was deemed an exceptional example of environmentalists and forestry companies coming together to achieve a common goal4.

2008 – Designation of Ship Harbour Long Lake
Ship Harbour Long Lake Wilderness Area (SHLLWA) is a 15,000-hectare wilderness between the communities of Ship Harbour and Musquodoboit harbor. Rich in ecological diversity, it encompasses more than 50 lakes, numerous streams, old forest, marshes, and waterways. In 2009, after two years of consultation and discussion, SHLLWA was officially designated under the Wilderness Areas Protection Act. This designation was one of the first positive outcomes of the collective pushes, including both regional environmental groups like EAC and local stewardship groups like the ESFWA5,6.

2009 – Caribou Mines Clear-cut
Another important threshold occurred in 2009 when a particularly visible roadside clear-cut emerged near Upper Musquodoboit (Figure 3). Local concern spread, including the formation of a ‘Save Caribou Mines’ group, and escalated when the scene was photographed and distributed by EAC and ESFW, resulting in significant public outcry around the province. The outcome was the design of a sustainable economic, social, and environmental policy. While the results of this policy remain to be seen, wide participation in the consultation process may have helped catalyze diverse groups to engage in collective action to protect a shared “sense of place”.

Figure 3: Caribou Mines Clearcut. Credit: Jamie Simpson

2009 – Otter Ponds Demonstration Forest
As part of the negotiations for SHLLWA (see above), a forest company relinquished their cutting rights on part of the public land involved in exchange for other areas nearby5. Several Mooseland community members were concerned over the company’s encroaching entitlements, fearing more clearcuts in the forests their families had used over many generations. After another highly visible clearcut appeared near the community, residents engaged in collective action.

A threshold moment occurred during a forest hike just outside Mooseland. Led by a local champion, members of various community groups began to discuss an innovative idea to help protect community and forest values in the area. These discussions led to the creation of a multi-stakeholder demonstration forest for uneven aged forestry.

By 2009, the idea had matured into a conceivable project, and was brought directly to the DNR Minister. The project aimed to create an economically viable, sustainable, and scalable initiative including community involvement, rural economic development, and uneven-aged forest management. Representatives of the four non-governmental organizations were given the opportunity to work with the lease of the public land to develop the newly formed Otter Ponds Demonstration Forest. After nearly a year of dialogue between these groups, agreements were signed on June 22, 2010.

2015 – “100 Wild Islands Legacy Campaign”
After research revealed unrecognized and globally significant never-cut boreal rainforest, Nova Scotia Nature Trust (NSNT), a land conservation organization, launched a “100 Wild Islands Legacy Campaign.” This work, driven by an environmental nongovernmental organization, happened alongside the provincial Protected Areas process, which ultimately resulted in a joint protection announcement with the province in June 2015. This included protection for an additional 1844 new hectares of land alongside the Eastern Shore Islands Wildlife Area.

The Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency (ACOA) is helping the Eastern Shore expand its tourism potential related to these islands, as part of a broader program called the Strategic Tourism Expansion Program (STEP). The work of several local groups helped catalyze and steer this process. The funding focuses on economic development through tourism. The aim is not only to protect a “sense of place,” but also to derive economic benefit from the opportunities presented by the protection efforts of the NSNT and recent additions to provincial Protected Areas and Parks.

Practical Outcomes

Over the past forty years, much has changed along the Eastern Shore. Back in 1975, local communities were just beginning to organize against external threats to their sense of place, including wilderness protection proposals and industrial forestry. As economic and demographic changes shaped evolving livelihoods and community identity over the years, key threshold events have also helped community groups, with diverse motivations, come together to create and support various conservation actions, from a demonstration forest to protected areas to stewardship skill building projects. However, there is still a deep need to support the resilience of the Eastern Shore and its members especially through rural economic development which respects identity, ‘sense of place’, and stewardship priorities.

With a large plot of wilderness protection secured and a community demonstration forest in works, environmental groups often laud the Eastern Shore as part of a provincial conservation success story. Certainly, protection leads to measureable conservation impacts that can benefit communities, and a community demonstration forest woodlot promises to promote local ecological stewardship practices as well as aiming to achieve economic sustainability. These same actors are also looking to innovative combinations of new and old technologies for new ways to protect the Eastern Shore identity including eco-tourism and adventure tourism.

References

All information was adapted from the Ecology Action Centre’s Eastern Shore Forests: Livelihoods, “Sense of Place” and Motivation for Conservation document.

1. Costanza, R., R. d’Arge, R. de Groot, S. Farber, M. Grasso, B. Hannon, K. Limburg, S. Naeem, R.V. O’Neill, J. Paruelo, R.G. Raskin, P. Sutton, & M. van den Belt. 1997. The value of the world’s ecosystem services and natural capital. Nature, 387: 253 – 260.

2. Wilson, S., Colman, R., O’Brien, M., and L. Pannozzo. 2001. Ecological, economic and social valuation of forest resources related to resource management, harvest practices, and multiple resource usage. Genuine Progress Indicator (GPI Atlantic).

3. Charles, A.T. 1997. Fisheries Management in Atlantic Canada. Ocean and Coastal Management, 35(2-3):101-119.

4. Colin Stewart Forest Forum Steering Committee. 2009. Final Report. http://northernpulp.ca/img/pdf/CSFFreport.pdf.

5. Prest, W. 2010. Atlantic Forestry Review. Making Progress: The Otter Ponds Demonstration Forest is now a reality. Guest Editorial. 3 pp.

6. Delong, J. October 11, 2009. The voices in the wilderness. The Nova Scotian.

View the complete CCRN’s Koh Pitak Community Story as a PDF

Phil Deardena and Dachanee Emphandhuba

Key Messages

• Conservation initiatives such as habitat creation and fishing restrictions have improved the biodiversity around Koh Pitak Island.

• Establishing a community-based tourism industry enabled further development of lower-consumptive activities to support island livelihoods and reduce dependence on marine resources.

• Community conservation on Koh Pitak Island was successful due to leadership, social capital, distributional equity, tourist attractions, media interest, village culture, support network, and timing.

Community Profile

Koh Pitak is an island ecosystem located approximately one km off the coast of Chumporn Province in the Gulf of Thailand in Bang Num Jeud Sub-District, Luang Suan District. The area of the small, relatively steep island is 113.92 ha, about one-half consisting of natural vegetation and the rest mainly coconut plantation or housing. The island is inhabited by about 45 related households, the majority of whom are Buddhist. Koh Pitak was established over a hundred years ago by fishers who took shelter along its coasts. The abundant sea resources surrounding the island allowed the community to flourish⁽¹⁾.

Figure 1. Map of Koh Pitak Island

Conservation and Livelihood Challenges

The marine environment around Koh Pitak Island was formerly very productive and diverse but suffered rapid declines around 20 years ago due to over-fishing and pollution. The decline in marine resources led the island community heavily into debt – a situation faced by many Thai fishing communities during this period⁽¹⁾. Senior levels of government were unresponsive to the plight of the community.

Community Initiatives

Conservation was seen at Koh Pitak as being an essential element of livelihood recovery. The community, under charismatic leadership, recognized that they themselves were partially to blame for the environmental degradation that had occurred and designed initiatives to reverse this trend. Some of these initiatives included⁽¹⁾:

• Establishing a community-based tourism industry that enabled further development of lower-consumptive activities to support island livelihoods and reduce dependence on marine resources.

• Creating an artificial reef which enhanced marine biodiversity and provided supplemental income for fishers.

• Protecting marine resources through seasonal closures, zoning and the use of grow nets.

• Designating a local no-take zone where villagers seed giant clams; this site has become popular for dive and snorkel tourism.

• Restoring mangrove populations along Koh Pitak’s shoreline.

• Improving waste disposal through the use of micro-organisms that rapidly digest organic waste. The treated wastewater from this system is then used to develop and water home gardens. These gardens have become a popular tourist attraction, where the village teaches visitors how to create such gardens.

• Initiated a study to understand the tourism carrying capacity of Koh Pitak by monitoring water quality, waste and the quality of visitor experience.

Figure 2: Mangroves replanted by the community

“I want it to be like it was 30 years ago, with the seas full of fish…” – Headman of Koh Pitak regarding their main goal for conservation

Figure 3: Interview with two of the main exponents of the “garden culture” of the Island

Influencing Marine Policies

As for all other coastal communities in Thailand, Koh Pitak is ostensibly governed by the same fisheries laws, rules and regulations of the country. However, through their own initiative, the community has managed to create unprecedented flexibility in this respect that is of national importance. One example is the stewardship of a local island, Koh Kram, about 1 km further offshore Koh Pitak.

Koh Kram has the best remaining biodiversity in the area and is part of a larger national park, Mu Koh Chumporn. Nevertheless, the administration of Mu Koh Chumporn has allowed the villagers to have stewardship over the island who, in turn, have developed a no-take fishing zone and oversee a reseeding and enhancement of giant clams in the area. They are allowed to enter and leave as they wish and take tourists there. This kind of practical relationship between the Thai National Parks Department and local communities is very rare.

Another important example is the current revision of the Thai National Fisheries Law to recognise the abilities of communities, such as Koh Pitak to manage their own fisheries. Although Koh Pitak figures prominently, it is not the only fishing community to be recognised in this area. Interestingly, the community has elected to have a smaller ocean area than permitted under the proposed bill, due to a practical recognition of their own limitations in patrolling a larger area.

Figure 4: View of fishing boat from Koh Pitak Island

Practical Outcomes

The success observed on Koh Pitak Island can be attributed to several factors:

Leadership – A charismatic, far seeing and powerful village leader was critical to the transformations.

Community social capital – The community has very high social capital and unity due to their inter-relatedness and common history.

Distributional equity – Activities are undertaken by groups; a proportion of all income is returned to the community fund with full transparency.

Tourist attractions – Koh Pitak does not offer the coastal tourism attractions typically associated with Thailand, such as long, white sand beaches and azure blue seas. Had it done so it is quite likely that it might have already been consumed by mass tourism. The attractions are more suited to the kind of community-based tourism that has developed there.

Media interest – There has been significant media interest in the transformation of the village, providing ample free marketing for tourism.

Village culture – The village enjoys a slow pace of life that is well suited to low-key tourism development.

Support network – The village enjoyed an extensive support network ranging from government agencies, institutions (such as universities) and other villages developing community-based initiatives.

Timing – The conservation and tourism initiatives coincided with the growing popularity of the Thai King’s “Self Sufficiency” philosophy which promotes small, local, low-impact development and living a moderate, self-dependent life without greed or overexploitation of, for example, natural resources.

Figure 5: A homestay extended out over the water

“For me […] conservation cannot be done by only one person, or by one community. It must have collaboration among communities and organizations that we call it “our conservation network”. It is a network of conservation in many aspects: giving ideas, supporting each other, and working together. Conservation is not only at our homeland but covers from mountain to the sea. This conservation network is like a jigsaw that missing one piece can bring a whole mission down.” – Koh Pitak village head concerning his thoughts on conservation

References

We thank S. Songpornwanich and A. Ruksapol for their ongoing work with the villagers and for granting access to their field work results.

See below for the Thai language abstract for this community story, “เกาะพิทักษ์, ประเทศไทย การฟื้นฟูวิถีชีวิตและทรัพยากรทางทะเลโดยการอนุรักษ์ของชุมชน”

A video report on the inhabitants of the scenic Koh Pitak island and their efforts to manage local ecotourism

View the CCRN’s Maya Zone Community Story as a PDF

Karla Diana Infante-Ramírez, Malloni Puc-Alcocer and *A. Minerva Arce-Ibarra El Colegio de la Frontera Sur, Mexico (ECOSUR), *aarce@ecosur.mx and aibarra@dal.ca

Key Messages

• The Maya Zone’s tropical rainforests in Quintana Roo state of Mexico provide many provisioning, regulating, cultural and supporting services.
• Both the government and the Maya people themselves have their own meanings of conservation and their own motivations for conservation.
• Community conservation initiatives must be part of national and international conservation programs.

Community Introduction

Quintana Roo’s “Maya Zone”, located in the Yucatan peninsula of Mexico, is a biocultural region with inhabitants who speak the Maya-Yucatec language in their daily lives. The Maya people rely on rainforest resources and agriculture as their main livelihoods. Maya communities also practice slash-and burn-cultivation (“milpa”) which is regarded as a cultural tradition. The communities are organized into common holdings called “ejidos”. Here we focus on the ejidos of Noh Cah and X-Maben (Figure 1), particularly their main towns (“Noh Cah” and “Señor”), with 86 and 3,095 inhabitants, respectively. In socio-economic terms, these communities are highly marginalized.

The Maya Zone is located in well-preserved tracts of tropical rainforest which provides a portfolio of ecosystem services1,2 to the users and communities dependent on it, including: a) provisioning services such as food (e.g., small-scale game, gathering of medicinal plants, and fish from water-filled sinkholes called “cenotes”); b) regulating services such as protection from hurricanes; c) cultural services such as using the sacred “cenotes” for baptism, and recreational inland fisheries; and d) supporting services including CO2 sink source.

The Maya people from these communities utilize these various services, and engage in conservation activities that help to maintain the services. The complex meanings they have for such conservation, as well as their motivations for conservation, are important factors in the social subsystem of the Maya Zone.

Figure 1. Study area in Quintana Roo´s Maya Zone.

Conservation and Livelihood Challenges

The Maya Zone area has been impacted by the effects of climatic variability (climate change). Over the last three decades, people in the communities have reported that rains have not arrived at expected times or in usual quantities. This has affected the productivity of traditional agriculture (“milpa”), a rain-fed system, resulting in insufficient harvests of staple foods to support local needs3. In addition to this challenge, several species are endangered in the region, for instance, the jaguar and the peccary, affecting biodiversity and the local residents.

In the 1990s, the federal government launched an international initiative on biodiversity conservation called the “Mesoamerican Biological Corridor”. However, that conservation program was based on a top-down approach, and hence did not (and still does not) take into account the kind of local conservation activities practiced by the local people. Being descendants of the ancient Maya civilization, and depending heavily on rainforest resources, people in communities of this area still actively look after those resources.

Community Initiative

Local authorities in the Maya Zone actively explore opportunities to receive support for environmental activities. A recent example was the possibility of applying for funding to a federal ‘payment for environmental services’ program. The local authorities recognized that many locals did not understand (from a Western-science perspective) what “an environmental service” was, and thus engaged with the CCRN-ECOSUR team to organize a seminar on ‘what is an environmental service’ and the ‘payment for environmental services’ program. Other seminars have been held, on topics suggested by the local residents and others suggested by the CCRN-ECOSUR team. Another was about “Climatic variability in the Yucatan Peninsula” (Figure 2) and addressed the influence of major weather events, for example the “El Niño Southern Oscillation” (ENSO), which affects mainly primary activities in the region.

These seminars aimed to improve the capacity of the communities in dealing with climate variability. This capacity building is being accompanied by monitoring of the Maya social-ecological system using indicators focused on climate variability and its impact on livelihoods, such as slash and burn-shifting cultivation.

Figure 2. Seminar presentation on “Climatic variability in the Yucatan Peninsula” delivered to inhabitants of Noh cah and “Señor” Maya communities by Karla Infante Ramírez (Photo credit: Karina Chale Silveira).

The capacity building activities that locals and community groups participated in also looked at the local meanings of conservation and motivations toward conservation. The results, presented back to the communities, provide feedback based on their experience and local knowledge (Figure 3).

Figure 3. Presenting results on the meanings of ‘Conservation’ back to Noh Cah inhabitants by Malloni Puc Alcocer. As local people from Noh cah prefer to discuss in the Maya language, Mr. Xool (red cap) worked in the research team as a translator (Photo credit: A. Minerva Arce-Ibarra).

Practical Outcomes

Understanding the meanings and motivations of the Maya people towards conservation is a complex subject. Research results indicate that there are two types of motivations for conservation in these Maya communities, namely extrinsic and intrinsic motivations. The former derives from government-based conservation programs, whereas the latter are people’s own motivations. According to Puc-Alcocer4, two types of conservation of the rainforest are in place in this region: one referring to the conservation programs implemented by the government and the other (the Kanan K’áax) which is a type of Maya community-based conservation. “Kanan K’áax” is a Maya phrase and literally means “to look after the rainforest” (Kanan means ‘look after’ and K’áax means ‘rainforest’).

Local Maya conservation initiatives that are in place need to be included in national and international conservation programs. Therefore, it is suggested that the improved understanding of Maya meanings and motivations for conservation reflected here be taken into consideration by conservation initiatives such as the “Mesoamerican Biological Corridor” and also by state institutions dealing with development programs in the Maya area and elsewhere in Mexico.

References

1. Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (2005). Millennium ecosystem assessment synthesis report. Island Press. Washington, D.C.

2. Infante-Ramírez, K. D. and Arce-Ibarra, A.M. (2015). Percepción local de los servicios ecológicos y de bienestar de la selva de la zona maya en Quintana Roo, México [Local perception of the ecological services and well-being of the Maya Zone’s rainforest from Quintana Roo, México]. Investigaciones Geográficas, Boletín del Instituto de Geografía, 2015(86), 67-81.

3. Bello-Baltazar, E. (2001). Milpa y madera, la organización de producción entre Mayas de Quintana Roo. Doctor of Science Thesis in Social Anthropology. Universidad Iberoamericana, México, DF.

4. Puc Alcocer, M. 2015. Conservación comunitaria de la selva maya en los ejidos Noh-Cah y X-maben, Quintana Roo. [Community-based conservation of the rainforest at the common holdings of Noh Cah and X-Maben, Quintana Roo]. Masters Thesis. El Colegio de la Frontera Sur. Chetumal.

Acknowledgements

We are grateful to the Maya people and their local authorities for granting us consent to undertake research on their lands. Our main source of funding came from the SSHRC-CCRN project. We thank all the support received from Saint Mary´s University and CCRN staff. Partial support for our research came from ECOSUR and CONACyT fiscal funds. CONACyT also granted scholarships to pursue the graduate studies of K.D. Infante-Ramírez and M. Puc-Alcocer.

View the complete CCRN’s Odisha Community Story as a PDF

Alex Zachariah-Chaligne,University of Manitoba; alexvzach@icloud.com

Key Messages   

• The Samudram Women’s Federation (SWF) monitors and protects the endangered olive ridley turtles through habitat restoration, artificial reef construction and sustainable fishing practices.

• The SWF is reducing the region’s poverty through income diversification, a financial literacy program and distributing low cost infrastructure and fishing equipment.

• The SWF is empowering woman through education, capacity building, training and networking.

Community Introduction

Odisha’s (Orissa) 482 km coastline has been blessed with abundant marine resources which support 38,000 small-scale fishers (Figure 1). The beaches in Odisha are largely sandy and are well known as “Arribada” beaches (Figure 2), where thousands of olive ridley sea turtles come every year to nest(1).

Figure 1: Map showing Odisha and the study area.

Conservation and Livelihood Challenges

Due to a number of factors, Odisha is one of the poorest states in India. The depletion of marine resources, annual cyclones and poverty cycles have forced many fishers to rely on illegal moneylenders and local traders, resulting in further indebtedness.

Figure 2: Mass nesting (arribada) of olive ridley turtles on the Odisha Coast, India.

Fishers are poor, marginalized and exploited by people from so-called “upper castes” who provide credit and charge high interest rates, typically close to 100% per annum(2). An additional challenge faced by the region’s fishers is government imposed fishing bans and restrictions which occur between February and May each year. The purpose of these bans is to protect the endangered olive ridley turtle during the peak nesting season. However, these actions inadvertently limit the earning capacity of small-scale fishing communities.

Community Initiative

The Samudram Women’s Federation (SWF) began in 1993 with 250 female members, as a response to conservation and livelihood challenges faced by the small-scale fishers. The SWF now has more than 5,800 members in 160 groups spread over 50 villages along the coast of Odisha. It is both a state level federation of women fish workers and a social enterprise. A key factor to its success, as recognized by the United Nations (2010 Equator prize), has been its joint focus on biodiversity conservation and community enterprise for poverty reduction. “Conservation is multidimensional and holistic, encompassing species, humans, environment and the whole biosphere” – Samudram’s view on Biodiversity Conservation.

The SWF fosters a holistic approach to conservation that is sensitive to local livelihoods and strives to achieve a balance between ecological conservation and social/economic goals. The presence of many complementary factors – economic, environmental, social and cultural – enables the Odisha fishing community to take up conservation and environmental stewardship.

Income Diversification

The SWF forms beach patrol groups with government conservation guards to monitor and protect olive ridley turtles during peak nesting periods. Since these periods coincide with the fishing restriction, beach patrols offer additional income.

Figure 3: Processed prawn pickle packets ready for the market.

Additionally, the Odisha Forest Department, and other research organizations, provide training in producing value-added marine products (Figure 3), and link the community with wholesale traders and exporters. The SWF provides low cost infrastructure and fishing equipment, and helps distribute relief supplies during cyclones. To address fishers’ dependence on money lenders and the ensuing poverty cycle, the SWF provides a financial literacy programme to encourage households to link up to mainstream banking and credit systems.

Empowering Women

The SWF created a platform for the voice of traditional women fishers to be heard. These women are empowered and made aware of their own rights, gaining improved self-esteem and dignity. Through collaborations, schools and adult education centres have been created. These resources have allowed members to improve their quality of life through education, increased literacy and better health practices. Exposure to mainstream media and institutions has boosted the confidence and pride of many traditionally disadvantaged women, allowing them to counter and question any law or system detrimental to their interests. “Being a Samudram member means being a vehicle of change in my community” – Samudram Member.

Community Conservation

Small-scale fishers have deep-seated beliefs about how to treat other living beings and their food basket, the sea. They see everything as a gift from Mother Ocean and ocean creatures such as turtles are seen as their brothers and sisters. Fishers take pride when thousands of turtles choose to return annually to their beaches to breed and nest and they take special care of these visitors (Figure 4). Beach patrols offer the community an opportunity to give something back to their Mother Ocean. “The health of the ocean is dependent on these turtles, if there are more turtles, the sea is healthy and there will be more fish” – Samudram Member.

Figure 4: Children holding the turtle hatchlings before releasing them into the sea.

The majority of households living on the coast self-identify as followers of the Hindu religion, where turtles are considered as one of the avatars of Lord Vishnu. Since Lord Vishnu is the preserver of life, some members of this community consider protecting turtles to be their responsibility. “Out of all the beaches, these turtles chose mine to lay their eggs. It means they trust us with their future and we are proud that they chose us and we make sure that we keep this trust” – Samudram Member.

Practical Outcomes

The Samudram Woman’s Federation is reducing poverty and protecting biodiversity through a number of different initiatives:

• Promoting the conservation of marine resources, and sustainable fishing practices to protect marine biodiversity.

• Linking economically marginalized fishing communities to wholesale markets and exporters.

• Generating income during fishing restriction periods through beach patrols and by selling value added and processed marine products (e.g. dry fish, pickles, papads).

• Gender empowerment through capacity building, training, knowledge dissemination and
networking.

• Community social development through building schools, health centres and organizing medical camps.

• Developing a community cooperative enterprise by providing social, financial and infrastructural support to local fishers.

References

1. Karnad, D., Isvaran, K., Kar, S.C. & Shankar, K. (2009). Lighting the way: Towards reducing misorientation of Olive ridley hatchlings due to artificial lighting in Rushikulya, India. Biological Conservation, 142(10): 2083-2088.

2. Nayak, P.K. & Berkes, F. (2010). Whose marginalization? Politics around environmental justice in India’s Chilika lagoon. Local Environment, 15(6): 553-567.

Acknowledgements

The author wishes to thank the following: The team of Samudram Women’s Federation and United Artist’s Association, Ganjam; Parvathy for her help in conducting and organizing interviews and group discussion, and being a great help as my interpreter; Mangaraj Panda and Govind Panda for their everyday help; The team at CBRM, Natural Resources Institute, University of Manitoba; Dr. Fikret Berkes for his timely advice and suggestions at every instance of the research; Durdana, Eranga, Ian, Dilbar and Alex for their help and support; and finally to all the fishing community in Nolianuagaon, Purnabandam, Arjyapally and Gokurkudham for allowing me to be a part of your community.

See below for the Odia language abstract for this community story.

View the CCRN’s The Gambia Community Story as a PDF

Cathy Conrad*, Amy Berry and Meagan Symington Saint Mary’s University; *cconrad@smu.ca

Key Messages

• Tujereng is a coastal community being negatively impacted by the adverse effects of climate change and has been developing innovative conservation, mitigation and adaptation strategies to reduce their vulnerability.
• CCRN researchers worked with the community to tell their story and provide policy recommendations to enhance the resilience of coastal communities and their ecosystems.
• Community members in Tujereng have pursued the government’s Community Forestry Programme (CFP), seeking new ways to sustain and expand local conservation efforts.

Community Introduction

The Gambia, located in sub-Saharan West Africa (Figure 1), is extremely vulnerable to the adverse effects of climate change. These include erratic rainfall patterns, extended drought, flooding, coastal erosion and sea level rise(1). These impacts will exacerbate current challenges of desertification, deforestation and decreasing water quality.

Figure 1: Map – The Gambia (Cartography: Will Flanagan)

The coastline consists of 80 km along the Atlantic Ocean and 200 km along the Gambia River, covered in mangroves and mudflats(2). Mangroves help protect coastal areas from flooding, provide crucial habitats for fish spawning, and are imperative for rice farming(3). Agricultural practices, along with tilapia, shrimp, and oyster farming, provide significant economic and livelihoods benefits in the country(4).

Conservation and Livelihood Challenges

The Gambia lacks necessary policies to adequately protect the coastal zone(2) (Figure 2). Citizens have reported feelings of anxiousness, uncertainty, and helplessness in response to a rapidly changing climate(5).

Figure 2: Coastal Zone in The Gambia – The Commuity of Tujereng. (Photo Credit: Oliver Woods)

Subsistence farmers and small-scale fishermen who rely heavily on their local environmental knowledge are the most likely to be impacted. In some cases, traditional knowledge that has been passed down from generation to generation, such as which crops to plant, where to hunt, and what weather to expect in a given season, is no longer reliable(6). Inhabitants who are highly vulnerable to perturbations in their environment have limited adaptive capacity to mitigate or adjust to the climatic impacts, yet, insufficient adaptation planning has occurred.

Community Initiative

Environmental Policy in The Gambia:
The Government of The Gambia created the National Adaptation Programme of Action (NAPA) in 2007, to identify the priority needs and activities in response to climate change. One of its priority projects was the expansion of community participation in the management of forests and protected areas. Globally, the management of forests is significant as deforestation is the second leading cause of anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions(7) – a leading contributor to climate change. In response, community-based forest conservation initiatives are increasing across The Gambia. To implement the NAPA, the government focused on Village Development Committees (VDC). Each community has a VDC with 10-12 members responsible for increasing the participation of rural communities in development processes(8). In theory, using VDCs would be more effective for designing and implementing adaptation strategies. However, VDCs sometimes exclude traditionally marginalized groups, and thus fail to fully represent all stakeholders in the process.

The CCRN and Tujereng
As part of a multi-scale alliance, CCRN researchers conducted community interviews (Figure 3) and workshops involving 33 youth and 43 adults in collaboration with the Department of Water Resources, National Environment Agency, Department of Forestry, Tujereng VDC, Mori Kunda Community Forest Committee, and Nova Scotia Gambia Association (NSGA). The goal of this alliance is to look at “how participatory adaptation (or mitigation) strategies are taking place” using a multi-sectorial approach. Additionally, incorporating local perceptions and indigenous knowledge will help mainstream climate change with other development issues in the community.

Figure 3: Interview with Tujereng Community Member. (Photo Credit: Oliver Woods)

Practical Outcomes

These partners were able to achieve the following outcomes: (1) document climate change and environmental perceptions which were previously unknown or underrepresented, (2) deliver effective educational interventions through successful collaboration with governmental and non-governmental agencies, (3) offer policy recommendations to improve environmental conservation and climate change adaptation and mitigation strategies for the benefit of local communities and future NAPA strategies. In addition, key trends emerged:

Voices Being Heard
Too often, climate discussions have been dominated by the voices of scientific experts, media broadcasters, and politicians, using modeling data and statistics, policy statements and executive summaries. The alliance of communities, government and researchers attempted to fill this gap, creating spaces for Tujereng to voice their concerns and evaluate the policies and management plans (the NAPA and the Community Forestry Programme) which affect their daily lives (Figure 4). Thus, giving a voice to Gambians who are living through climate change; to share what they have to say about their experiences and challenges and to encourage consideration. Their relationship with their environment is being transformed, and this collaboration worked to provide meaningful and context-specific community-based educational opportunities, as well as working towards integrating the voices and perceptions of the community into government policies.

Figure 4: Consulting with the Tujereng Council of Elders. (Photo Credit: Oliver Woods)

Unpredictable Weather is Invalidating Certain Traditional Knowledge
Knowledge passed down from parent to child has long dictated which crops to plant, when, where, and what yields to expect, although this is increasingly being affected by climate change. Farmers have suffered unpredictable, irregular rainy seasons in recent years largely invalidating their traditional knowledge. For fishers, changing wind patterns are preventing them from fishing in certain areas. The adaptive capacity of Gambians to respond to climate change is already very low, leading to concern for well-being, especially of vulnerable members of society.

Lessons learned from the Community Forestry Programme (CFP)
Tujereng is threatened by water and food insecurity, as well as forest loss and degradation, thus increasing their vulnerability to climate change. In an attempt to protect local forest reserves, community members in Tujereng have pursued the government’s Community Forestry Programme (CFP), seeking new ways to sustain and expand local conservation efforts. Community engagement with internal and external agencies provides further support to this process by creating spaces for enhanced collaboration, education, and linkages between actors.

Communal Leadership
Tujereng is well-organized, with a well-respected Alkalo (village head) and strong sense of communal leadership. Men and women from various ages and associations are routinely consulted on different community matters. Every Sunday a ‘Council of Elders’ holds a ‘community court’ where local disputes can be brought to the attention of, and mediated by, community members. The community court is at times used to discuss environmental issues and advocate for conservation initiatives within the community.

The Role of Community Groups
Within the community, several groups are influential in forest conservation. The Mori Kunda clan, known as religious scholars and traditional healers, are responsible for the protection of the nearby forest, which provides forest products and traditional medicine. The Mori Kunda contribute to the wider community of Tujereng by providing communal resources such as firewood for gatherings or fencing materials for local soccer fields and school grounds. The Tujereng NSGA Peer Health Educators (PHE) also contribute to forest conservation by educating their peers and the larger community about environmental stewardship as a means of empowerment and knowledge mobilization through the use of drama (Figure 5).

Figure 5: Tujereng Peer Health Educators. (Photo Credit: Oliver Woods)

Major obstacles to the CFP include enforcement, economic sustainability and the regeneration of indigenous vegetation. Moreover, the CFP in Tujereng does not currently include mangroves, which could considerably improve the overall climate adaptation strategy and decrease local vulnerability to food insecurity. The integration of local knowledge has a strong capacity to enhance the community’s motivation for environmental stewardship through public environmental education and awareness-building programs as well as enforcement initiatives.

References

1. Government of The Gambia. (2013). Mainstreaming climate change resilience into development planning in the Gambia. International Institute for Environment and Development. Banjul: The Gambian Ministry of Finance and Economic Affairs.

2. Drammeh, F. (2013). Assessing and adapting to Climate-Change Induced Sea-level rise on the Southern Coastline of The Gambia. New York: United Nations-Nippon Foundation Fellowship.

3. Jallow, B. (1999). Coastal zone of The Gambia and the Abidjan region in Côte d’Ivoire: sea level rise vulnerability, response strategies, and adaptation options. Climate Research, 12, 129–136.

4. Crow, B & Carney, j. (2013). Commercializing Nature: Mangrove Conservation and Female Oyster Collectors in The Gambia. Antipode, 45(2): 275–293.

5. Turner, N.J., Clifton, H. (2009). “It’s so different today”: Climate change and indigenous lifeways in British Columbia, Canada. Global Environmental Change 19, 180-190.

6. Vedwan, N., Rhoades R.E. (2001). Climate change in the Western Himalayas of India: a study of local perception and response. Climate Research 19, 109-117.

7. UNEP, FAO, UNFF. (2009). Vital Forest Graphics. [Lambrechts, C., Wilkie, M., Rucevska, I. & Sen, M. (Eds.)]. Nairobi, KE: UNEP/GRID-Arendal.

8. National Environment Agency. (2010). State of the Environment Report (SER-TG). 2nd ed. Jimpex Road, Kanifing, The Gambia-West Africa.

Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank the community of Tujereng, the Mori Kunda Community Forest Committee, the Nova Scotia Gambia Association, the National Environment Agency, the Department of Water Resources, and the Department of Forestry in The Gambia as well as the Robin Rigby Trust Fund.

This research is being carried out with the aid of a Doctoral Research Award from the Canadian International Development Research Centre, a doctoral award from the Social Science and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) of Canada, a SSHRC grant held by Dr. Derek Armitage as part of a Coastal-Marine Transformation Project, and support from the SSHRC-funded Community Conservation Research Network (CCRN).