Pradeep K. Katiha

Institutional arrangements in fisheries of Ganges River system

Institutional arrangements have been compared in three stretches under different management regimes, namely: (i) open access (River Ganges from Kanpur to Farakka); (ii) private contractor (River Yamuna from Yamuna Nagar to Panipat; (iii) fishermen co-operative (River Ghagra from Ghagra Barrage to Faizabad). The ownership of riverine stretches of Ganges River system is with Departments of Fisheries, Forests, Revenue and the Village Panchayats under Governments of riparian states. The ownership of more than one department in some stretches resulted in more than one lessee for fishing and conflicts among local fishers and degradation of fish stocks. The open access regime has no institutional arrangements, while for cooperative and individual/private regime, the river was leased out for 3–7 years. The lease was generally renewed for fishermen co-operatives, but for private contractors it was not certain due to bidding through open auction system and higher base price. The annual fishing efforts were at maximum and probability of irrational exploitation was high under private regime due to fishing practices adopted and limited lease period. Equity issues were better in co-operative and open access. CPUE was the highest under open access, while the costs were lowest for fisher co-operatives. Fish prices were better for fish co-operatives due to better bargaining power and collective fish disposal. The annual net returns were the maximum for fishers under open access, but net returns per kg of fish produced and output – input ratios were the highest for fishers of co-operatives. This indicated the highest working efficiency and equitable distribution of benefits under co-operative regime. The study concluded that involvement of actual fisher institutions in riverine fisheries may be encouraged for better fisheries management. A need was also felt for periodic evaluation of these institutional arrangements towards their performance and natural resources use.

Socioeconomic status of riverine fisher communities in India

The inland traditional fishers, such as those from riverine, estuarine, reservoirs, and wetlands of India, are primarily dependent on natural waters for their livelihoods. Governments at various levels have made several efforts, including decentralization of management rights, promotion of cooperatives and formation of self-help groups, to develop the fisheries. Despite these efforts, production from most of the culture-based inland fishery waters (particularly adopting fish stock enhancements) is below potential, as a vast gap is observed between the potential and existing fish production. There is immense potential for increasing the fishing effort, production and income. Capture fishery resources, particularly in the riverine fisheries, are declining due to resource degradation and excessive exploitation. The impact of fisheries developmental programmes instituted by government agencies like the National Fisheries Development Board are hardly recognised on fisheries communities due to the multiple-use common pool resource nature of the fishing resource. Comprehensive investigations on the socioeconomic status of riverine fisher communities are rare. The present investigation studies the socioeconomic conditions of riverine fisher communities in different regions of India. The study covered six states of five regions in India: Uttar Pradesh in the North; Tamil Nadu and Kerala in the South; Orissa and West Bengal in the East; Gujarat in the West; Assam in the northeastern region. The overall socioeconomic index results concluded that almost all the regions have achieved only 46% to 52% of the socioeconomic criteria studied. Institutional financial support for alternate income generation activities; organisation under self-help groups, and vocational training for fisherwomen to undertake alternate income-generating activities during the closed/off season are some of the suggestions resulting from the investigation.