KEY MESSAGES

Access to marine resources and the ocean is important for the well-being of coastal populations. In Canada, the ability of many coastal and Indigenous communities to access and benefit from the ocean is a growing issue. Access for coastal and Indigenous communities should be a priority consideration in all policies and decision-making processes related to fisheries and the ocean in Canada. Taking action now could reverse the current trend and ensure that coastal and Indigenous communities thrive in the future.

The Georgian Bay Biosphere Reserve (GBBR) sponsored the event, featuring strong youth leadership and a sharing of historical and current experiences through cultural dances and drumming.

Reconciliation in Canada refers to recognizing injustices against Indigenous peoples and their impacts, and committing to forging mutually-respectful relationships between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal peoples.

What does a youth perspective of the process of reconciliation have to do with a UNESCO biosphere reserve’s mandate to promote conservation and sustainable livelihoods / development through research, education and training?

Globally, UNESCO sites are called to do their work through the lens of the 2007 United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP), which Canada signed on to UNDRIP in 2016.  Nationally, Canadian Biosphere Reserves responded to this call in June 2017 by adding reconciliation to their activities. In doing so, they recognize that successfully fulfilling their mandate requires an acknowledgement of the historical oppression of Indigenous peoples in Canada, and a commitment to respecting Indigenous cultures, knowledges and governance systems.  

In the GBBR, the youth’s project is rooted in the idea that land-based education and cultural identity are critical for stewardship success.

“Conservation and stewardship in our community begins with a sense of place and caring for the land”, explained GBBR Executive Director, Becky Pollock. “By sharing Anishinabe (Ojibway) cultural perspectives about our connection to land and water in the only high school in our Biosphere Reserve, we advance a commitment to conservation in our community.”

Book presentation event (left) and student authors Gracie Crafts, Mackenzie Elwes, Sara Burns, Dawson Bloor, and Taylor Judge (right). Photos: Meg Wallace Photography

Indigenous and “mainstream Canadian” students wrote about conserving cultural traditions such as honouring the land and different knowledges, and about reconciling traditional and Western cultures as a step toward healing and the relationship-building that underpins the GBBR’s community conservation and livelihoods initiatives.

The video compilation of the reading and performance is being edited and produced by youth at Parry Sound High School for public viewing soon, with sponsorship from CCRN.

Right: Student author Gracie Crafts reads to 700 elementary school children in Parry Sound. 
Left: Project supporters Dr. Becky Pollock (GBBR) and teacher Patti Jenkins (Parry Sound High School)

Photo credits unless otherwise stated: Georgian Bay Biosphere Reserve on Facebook

Information in this post was provided by CCRN researcher Sharmalene Mendis-Millard, with thanks to Becky Pollock

Concerns about the negative consequences of conservation for local people have prompted attention toward how to address the social impacts of different conservation projects, programs, and policies. Inevitably, when actions are taken to protect or manage the environment this will produce a suite of both positive and negative social impacts for local communities and resource users. Thus, a challenge for conservation and environmental decision-makers and managers is maximizing social benefits while minimizing negative burdens across social, economic, cultural, health, and governance spheres of human well-being. The last decade has seen significant advances in both the methods and the metrics for understanding how conservation and environmental management impact human well-being. There has also been increased uptake in socio-economic monitoring programs in conservation organizations and environmental agencies. Yet, little guidance exists on how to integrate the results of social impact monitoring back into conservation management and decision-making. We recommend that conservation organizations and environmental agencies take steps to better understand and address the social impacts of conservation and environmental management. This can be achieved by integrating key components of the adaptive social impact management (ASIM) cycle outlined below into decision-making and management processes**.

Conservation and environmental management can produce both positive and negative social impacts for local communities and resource users. Thus it is necessary to understand and adaptively manage the social impacts of conservation over time. This will improve social outcomes, engender local support and increase the overall effectiveness of conservation.

Adaptive social impact management
Adaptive social impact management (ASIM) is “the ongoing and cyclical process of monitoring and adaptively managing the social impacts of an initiative through the following four stages: profiling, learning, planning and implementing.”

1. Profiling – The cycle begins with defining the scope and social profile for the social impact management program. This involves identifying spatial boundaries, timelines, and available resources, as well as creating a basic profile of the social system under consideration.
2. Learning – The second stage focuses on developing an understanding of the actual positive and negative social impacts of the project to date as well as how and why these impacts have occurred. It involves data collection, analysis, evaluation, and communication.
3. Planning – During the third stage, managers and practitioners identify alternative courses of action and their respective potential impacts, deliberate and make decisions regarding which actions to take, and revise management policies and plans accordingly.
4. Implementing – The final stage is where decisions are put into action to adapt conservation and management. Lessons learned are shared across sites and to managers and policy-makers to inform decisions, policies and programs.

**For more information, refer to the related publication: Maery Kaplan-Hallam & Nathan J. Bennett (2017). Adaptive social impact management for conservation and environmental management. Conservation Biology. Link: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/cobi.12985/full

This work was supported by the Social Science and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) of Canada & the Liber Ero Fellowship Program. Author affiliations include: OceanCanada Partnership (University of British Columbia), Center for Ocean Solutions (Stanford) and the Community Conservation Research Network (CCRN).

Featured image from https://nathanbennett.ca/

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 Haruku Village Community Story as a PDF

Ahmad Mony and Arif Satria

Key Messages

• Haruku village is a coastal community that uses sasi laut a local knowledge and culture-based practice of coastal resource conservation.
• Sasi laut was weakened in the 1980s and the early part of the 2000s, due to a lack of government concern about destructive fishing activities as well as the Maluku conflict in 1999-2002. Subsequently, starting in early 2004, through the cooperation of multiple stakeholders, the sasi laut system has strengthened, helping local fishing communities to consider global issues related to conservation practices.
• Cooperation of multiple parties at multiple levels is the best approach for sustainable sasi laut practices.

Community Profile

Haruku Village is located in the island of the same name, in Malaku Province, Indonesia (Figure 1). Most of the island is hilly terrain and nearly all of the population is along the coast. The island consists of four Muslim villages and seven Christian villages ⁽¹⁾. The people of Haruku Island depend on the plantation sector as their main livelihood. Marine resources are not yet used as the main support system for livelihoods due to limitations on local utilisation of fishery commodities.

In the island, an indigenous practice of coastal resource protection, called sasi laut, has been used for hundreds of years. Sasi laut is a form of traditional institution regulating the management of coastal resources based on the knowledge, norms and value systems of the Indigenous people of Maluku.

Figure 1: Location of Haruku Island

This system regulates the rights and obligations of the indigenous peoples in utilizing and protecting coastal resources. As defined by Harkes and Novaczek (2000, pp.1-3), sasi laut “…prohibits the use of destructive and intensive gear (poisonous plants and chemicals, explosives, small mesh lift-nets), but also defines seasonal rules of entry, harvest and activities allowed in specific parts of the sea. The regulations are guarded and enforced by an institution known as the kewang, which functions as a local police force. Their legitimacy, as well as that of the sasi institution itself, is based on adat or customary law”.

Sasi laut has been implemented by the Harukunese for over 400 years. This practice is related to the establishment of Haruku Village and their motivation to save lompa fish (Thrissima balema), a sacred fish species relating to the history of the founding of the village (Figure 2) ⁽⁴⁾.

Figure 2: Harvesting Lompa Fish

Climate change in these coastal areas, which is characterised by ecological and seasonal changes, has provided an understanding for indigenous peoples about the importance of maintaining sasi laut as a local institution to protect coastal areas. Maintaining sasi laut, amidst the impacts of climate change and social transformation, will have an important impact on the preservation of coastal and inland resources, the preservation of culture, and ensuring the availability of fish in the waters.

Conservation and Livelihood Challenges

Recently, the practices of sasi laut has weakened due to the external and internal pressures of the actors involved. The external factors that threatened the existence of the legal practice of sasi laut were modernisation and commercialisation, which resulted in the erosion of traditional values⁽²⁾. Within the Haruku society, sasi laut practices were faced with challenges, such as internal political conflicts, competition in the local economy, regeneration of kewang, and the power of outsiders who did not consider the social and cultural conditions of the indigenous community. In addition, locals spoke of such factors as access to fishery commodity markets, capital limitation, and lack of human resources as the main constraints to switch the orientation of their livelihood income from the plantation to fishery systems (i.e., fishing/aquaculture).

The actors involved in the development of sasi laut had three main interests, economic, ecological and cultural. The economic interests were normally represented by communities, businesses, and local governments. The ecological interests were represented by the traditional leaders, NGOs, universities, donor agencies, environmentalists and researchers. Meanwhile, cultural interests were represented by the indigenous communities, universities, and government. This mixture of interests in the region created uncertainty about the implementation of sasi laut, as kewang were unsure of which motivations to follow, thus weakening sasi laut practices.

Community Initiative

The indigenous community of Haruku, which had been more moderate and adaptive to the issues of coastal resource management, drew on cooperation among actors to further develop sasi laut. Advocacy of relationships with outside parties aroused a new awareness to expand the scope of sasi laut, and the adaptation of new values in sasi laut gained the support of the community. Furthermore, the people were actively involved in such programmes as a mangrove nursery and rehabilitation of mangrove areas in the estuary of the Learisa Kayeli River, one of the lompa fish habitats. The importance of mangrove rehabilitation had been increasingly recognized after the occurrence of coastal erosion in the last few years, which directly threatens human settlements and other public infrastructure.

Practical Outcomes

Due to both external and internal pressures, changes in the political, governance, natural resources and societal livelihood systems have affected the orientation of the sasi laut management system in Maluku, resulting in some positive and negative changes:

First, there has been an increasing awareness of efforts to protect coastal areas and the natural resources therein. This awareness encouraged the emergence of the kewang, assisted by outside parties, such as NGOs and donor agencies, to widen the area protection of the sasi laut system on other resources.

Figure 3: Village Leaders of Haruku

Second, the emergence of gender awareness has encouraged women’s involvement in the sasi laut institution. The involvement of women in the institution was based on the consideration that one of the dimensions of indigenous sasi is female, providing a certain space for the presence of women in the sasi institution pertaining to the processes of law enforcement against woman offenders on sasi.

Third, as a social institution, sasi is vulnerable to family economic problems during its implementation. To overcome this problem, kewang have been provided a business unit in the form of economic management of marine tourism. Kewang have some guest houses with some units rented to researchers and tourists (local and foreign) visiting the Haruku Island, thereby providing additional income locally.

Figure 4: Gosong Bird Conservation

Fourth, there has been a decline in involvement in kewang that is needed to perform surveillance on resources. Some NGOs and donors have noticed problems of kewang regeneration through education and training.

Fifth, the rise of awareness of kewang, and their experience in dealing with outside parties (NGOs, universities and donors) has encouraged kewang empowerment. Kewang of Negeri Haruku have established the Foundation of Haru-Ukui Kalesang to empower kewang in Maluku and coordinate implementation of inter-kewang of sasi laut in Haruku Island. Through this foundation, the kewang in Haruku Island have facilitated some kewang leaders from other villages to attend national seminars on coastal conservation and empowerment of indigenous people (Figure 3).

Recently sasi laut has been developed by expanding the objects of conservation, including mangrove ecosystems, the Gosong bird (Eulipoa wallacei, or Moloccan scrubfowl), turtles, and other coastal resources (Figure 4). In addition, sasi luat is supporting marine tourism through a sasi laut festival in Haruku Village (Figure 5). Gender discourse has also been adopted through the representation of women in the local police corps, kewang. This was facilitated through the efforts made by such external parties as NGOs, donor agencies, and universities.

Figure 5: Sasi Laut Festival of Haruku Village

In terms of legislation, the practice of local wisdom in Indonesia, such as sasi laut, has been recognized by the state through various laws and regulations. Political and natural resource governance changes, coupled with the strengthening of marine conservation discourse in Indonesia, make sasi laut more effective for coastal area protection and resources therein.

In Maluku, the strengthening of sasi laut practices is able to answer the challenges of sustainability in the local system, particularly in implementing Traditional Ecological Knowledge (TEK), amid global efforts to develop marine conservation networks. Therefore, the authority of sasi laut management must be responsive to the dynamics of the political system, economy, law, governance, science and technology. In conclusion, the transformation of sasi laut should be aimed at strengthening the capacity of human and institutional resources that are adaptive and responsive to external changes.

References

Acknowledgements

Our gratitude is expressed to the community of Haruku Village who has assisted us a lot in collecting data for this research.