Community-based management induces rapid recovery of a high-value tropical freshwater fishery

Campos-Silva, João Vitor and Peres, Carlos A. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1588-8765 (2016) Community-based management induces rapid recovery of a high-value tropical freshwater fishery. Scientific Reports, 6. ISSN 2045-2322

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Abstract

Tropical wetlands are highly threatened socio-ecological systems, where local communities rely heavily on aquatic animal protein, such as fish, to meet food security. Here, we quantify how a ‘win-win’ community-based resource management program induced stock recovery of the world’s largest scaled freshwater fish (Arapaima gigas), providing both food and income. We analyzed stock assessment data over eight years and examined the effects of protected areas, community-based management, and landscape and limnological variables across 83 oxbow lakes monitored along a ~500-km section of the Juruá River of Western Brazilian Amazonia. Patterns of community management explained 71.8% of the variation in arapaima population sizes. Annual population counts showed that protected lakes on average contained 304.8 (±332.5) arapaimas, compared to only 9.2 (±9.8) in open-access lakes. Protected lakes have become analogous to a high-interest savings account, ensuring an average annual revenue of US$10,601 per community and US$1046.6 per household, greatly improving socioeconomic welfare. Arapaima management is a superb window of opportunity in harmonizing the co-delivery of sustainable resource management and poverty alleviation. We show that arapaima management deserves greater attention from policy makers across Amazonian countries, and highlight the need to include local stakeholders in conservation planning of Amazonian floodplains.

Item Type:	Article
Additional Information:	This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons license, unless indicated otherwise in the credit line; if the material is not included under the Creative Commons license, users will need to obtain permission from the license holder to reproduce the material. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
Uncontrolled Keywords:	biodiversity,conservation biology,sustainability,wetlands ecology,sdg 1 - no poverty,sdg 2 - zero hunger,sdg 15 - life on land ,/dk/atira/pure/sustainabledevelopmentgoals/no_poverty
Faculty \ School:	Faculty of Science > School of Environmental Sciences
UEA Research Groups:	Faculty of Science > Research Centres > Centre for Ecology, Evolution and Conservation Faculty of Science > Research Groups > Environmental Biology Faculty of Science > Research Groups > Resources, Sustainability and Governance (former - to 2018)
Related URLs:	http://www.nature.com/articles/srep34745
Depositing User:	Pure Connector
Date Deposited:	28 Oct 2016 10:00
Last Modified:	21 Oct 2022 07:32
URI:	https://ueaeprints.uea.ac.uk/id/eprint/61146
DOI:	10.1038/srep34745

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