Alternative technology development in fisheries and Coops

V.VivekanandanFormer Chief Executive

South Indian Federation of Fishermen Societies

What this story is about

• The quest for alternative boat building technologies on the south west coast of India

• The introduction and spread of marine plywood boats all along the SW coast

• The role of fishworker coops in the new technology development

• Long term impacts• The current challenge of sustainable fisheries

and future of small scale fisheries

Replacing the kattumaram

• 1980: Fr.Gillet, KSSS & CAT• Perceived shortage of Albizia logs• Idea to develop Kattumaram made of other materials

—Fibre glass or ferrocement• Partnership with Edwin Gifford and ITDG• Marine plywood boat built with “stitch and glue”

methodology• First prototype of a Kottar Kat, a kattumaram

substitute meant for sailing and rowing introduced in 1981

Context of new tech introduction• Blue revolution starting from mid 1960s• Introduction of mechanised trawlers leading to

creation of dualism in fisheries: “new modern” sector and “traditional/artisanal” sector

• Competition for resources between two sectors• Decline of share of traditional fishermen and

depletion of near shore fisheries• Traditional fishermen desperate to go deeper to tap

new fish resources just to survive• Arrival of imported Outboard Motors; innovate

fishermen put OBM on kattumaram

Kottarkat, a runaway success• Fishermen latched on to the Kottarkat as most suitable beach

landing and surf crossing boat for use with OBMs• Increased range of operations and caught more fish• However, Kottarkat not designed for use with motors and

started cracking up• Changes in design to suit motorisation and call back of sold

boats to strengthen them• The new marine plywood boat become a runaway success—

not as kattumaram substitute but as an intermediate technology between traditional boats and mechanised trawlers

• It was later found that even the shortage of Albizia was not really true: new social forestry initiative in Kerala had actually led to increase in Albizia availability!

SIFFS

• Around 1980 another initiative in neighbouring Trivandrum district of Kerala was taking off

• “Marianad” model of fishermen coop to market fish and provide credit emerged in 1970 and started slowly spreading in Trivandrum and Kanyakumari districts through Church organisations and associated NGOs

• Trivandrum fish marketing coops got together in 1980 to form the South Indian Federation of Fishermen Societies or SIFFS to take fish marketing to higher level

SIFFS takes over responsibility of new technology

• Fr.Gillet and his associates, seeing that the new boats were mainly going to Kerala decided that SIFFS as a fishermen’s coop federation is most appropriate institution to take up further development of the new technology and to commercialise it

• Reluctantly, SIFFS took up the challenge and started a boat building unit in 1983

• As traditional fishermen started rapidly modernising and adopting OBMs across the south west coast of India, the plywood boat demand increased

• Over time SIFFS developed many new designs to suit users of other traditional craft like vallams (canoes)

• Network of production and repair centres in Kerala, TN and Southern Karnataka

Current status

• Private sector—entirely small and cottage sector scale—has adopted technology and now manufactures much more boats than SIFFS

• Over a 100,000 boats sold all over the SW coast using marine ply boat technology; 25,000 boats currently in operation from Kanyakumari to Ratnagiri; SIFFS share around 25%

Short and medium term impacts• Small scale fisheries (SSF), facing extinction due to competition with

trawlers, survived, even started thriving• Increase in productivity of ssf with significant increases in capital costs

and operating costs• Greater dependency on fossil fuels and state subsidies for kerosene the

fuel for OBMs.• Scaling up took place incrementally allowing for capital accumulation in

ssf without losing control to outside investors• Owner-worker differentiation, which was weak earlier, became more

pronounced, but class formation in the classical sense was weak due to hurdles for accumulation (traditional sharing system) with traditional village communities continuing to have control of fishing boats

• By 2000, nearly 90% of small fishing boats are motorised—very little of sailing and rowing vessels left in the fishery

Long term impacts

• New technology introduced when overall fisheries resource exploitation was high in coastal waters but low in offshore and deep sea areas of India’s EEZ

• Now both mechanised motors and motorised vessels fish all over the Indian seas with over 90% of the potential yield being already exploited

• While trawling remains a major problem for fisheries management, small scale sector is also now guilty of overfishing and resource degradation

• SSF has adopted scaled down versions of mechanised fishing gear—mini-trawl, ring seine, etc.

Coop control over technology--advantages

• The role played by SIFFS in boat building has been beneficial:– Continuing R&D to provide boats to suit different areas

and needs– Strong fishermen oversight of R&D and boat building

has ensured boat prices and repair charges are reasonable

– In addition to price leadership, SIFFS ensures quality benchmarks and indirectly regulates private boat yards

– Establishing control over imported OBMs and spares through direct imports—all-India distributor of OBMs

Coops--Limitations

• While coops have been useful in market exploitation of fishermen—fish marketing, credit and inputs—they have proved ineffective in fisheries resource management

• The trade unions that came up with SIFFS, well beyond the area of SIFFS, to fight for small fishermen rights, have also been found ineffective in resource management

New set of institutions for resource management

• History of fisheries management by traditional and customary institutions across the coast before coming of blue revolution

• These institutions continue to operate with diminished power as mechanised boats operate outside their control and motorisation has resulted in new divisions within SSF

• State laws to manage fisheries have emerged with some regulations implemented by the state

• State intervention in resource management only marginally successful

• A new regime for fisheries management is called for• The “Co-management” idea• Current experiments