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Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons

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Nature and Society Relations

Series

2014

Local ecological knowledge

Articles 1 - 3 of 3

Full-Text Articles in Social and Behavioral Sciences

Navigating Over Space And Time: Fishing Effort Allocation And The Development Of Customary Norms In An Open-Access Mangrove Estuary In Ecuador, Christine M. Beitl May 2014

Navigating Over Space And Time: Fishing Effort Allocation And The Development Of Customary Norms In An Open-Access Mangrove Estuary In Ecuador, Christine M. Beitl

Anthropology Faculty Scholarship

Fisheries are increasingly understood as complex adaptive systems; but the cultural, behavioral, and cognitive factors that explain spatial and temporal dynamics of fishing effort allocation remain poorly understood. Using Geographic Information Systems (GIS) as a visualization tool, this paper combines catch-per-unit-effort (CPUE) and ethnographic data about the Ecuadorian mangrove cockle fishery to explore patterns in fishing effort and the social production of fishing space. I argue that individual decisions about where, when, and how to fish result in spatial and temporal patterns in effort allocation, ultimately regulating open-access fisheries that typically operate on a first-come, first-serve basis. These emergent patterns …


Hog Daddy And The Walls Of Steel: Catch Shares And Ecosystem Change In The New England Groundfishery, Jennifer F. Brewer Jan 2014

Hog Daddy And The Walls Of Steel: Catch Shares And Ecosystem Change In The New England Groundfishery, Jennifer F. Brewer

Geography

The U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration implemented marketbased fishery management in the New England groundfishery as catch shares, controlling aggregate harvests through tradable annual catch quotas allocated to fishing groups called sectors. Policy supporters assert that resulting markets raise conservation incentives. In compliance with the Magnuson–Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act, species assessments permit catch shares to replace more spatially and temporally specific constraints on fishing gear, time, areas, and daily harvest limits. Qualitative evidence from field interviews and participant observation questions the efficacy of catch shares. Fishing industry members observe that increased presence of large trawl vessels in …


Harvesting A Knowledge Commons: Collective Action, Transparency, And Innovation At The Portland Fish Exchange, Jennifer F. Brewer Jan 2014

Harvesting A Knowledge Commons: Collective Action, Transparency, And Innovation At The Portland Fish Exchange, Jennifer F. Brewer

Geography

While localist visions of alternative food systems advocate for the expansion of local ecological knowledge through more proximate producerconsumer relationships, globalized seafood supply-demand chains persist. Moving beyond this dichotomy, commons scholars recognize that collective action among resource users at the local level can shape cross-scalar producer relations with government and more capitalized firms operating in regional and global markets. In the case of the New England groundfishery, a quasi-public fish auction not only transformed the scalar, logistical, and financial parameters of harvester-buyer relationships, it altered the production and use of local knowledge among some harvesters, and their technological choices. Resulting …