Human–crocodile interactions in the western Solomon Islands: the importance of local data for reducing attacks on people
- Authors: Shankar, Aswani , Matanzima, Joshua
- Date: 2024
- Subjects: To be catalogued
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/439922 , vital:73720 , xlink:href="https://doi.org/10.1017/S003060532300176X"
- Description: Interactions between people and the saltwater crocodile Crocodylus porosus frequently occur on islands and in coastal regions. Saltwater crocodiles impact people's lives and livelihoods by attacking them, resulting in minor or serious injuries, and by interfering in people's foraging activities. Retaliation may include killing the crocodiles involved. To reduce such human–crocodile interactions, data about the occurrence of incidents are required. We present data on encounters with crocodiles and attacks on people in the Roviana Lagoon, Solomon Islands. Data includes time of incident, gender, age and activity of the victim, water conditions and what happened to the crocodile after the incident. We used a questionnaire to capture the details of incidents that occurred during 2000–2020 in the villages of Dunde, Baraulu, Nusa Hope and Kozou. Most incidents were in the evening, mostly involving women, and most victims were aged 20–39 years or ≥ 60 years. In all cases people were attacked while gleaning for shellfish in the mangroves. Attacks occurred irrespective of whether the water was clear or murky, and in all cases the crocodiles were not killed. Such site-specific data will facilitate the formulation of strategies for reducing negative interactions between people and crocodiles in this particular location. Although the saltwater crocodile is categorized as Least Concern on the IUCN Red List, research such as this provides data that can be used for promoting coexistence with and conservation of this species.
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- Date Issued: 2024
Benthic mapping using local aerial photo interpretation and resident taxa inventories for designing marine protected areas
- Authors: Shankar, Aswani , Lauer, Matthew
- Date: 2006
- Subjects: To be catalogued
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/439059 , vital:73541 , xlink:href="https://doi.org/10.1017/S0376892906003183"
- Description: Given the frequent socioeconomic, political and concomitant ecological failures of science-driven marine protected area (MPA) programmes, it is now important to design MPAs by integrating natural and social science research more comprehensively. This study shows how indigenous peoples assisted in the design of MPAs by identifying marine substrates and related resident taxa on aerial photos, information which was then incorporated into a geographical information system (GIS) database, along with dive survey data. Two questions were asked: (1) Is indigenous ecological knowledge accurate enough for mapping the benthos and associated taxa? (2) Is such an approach an appropriate way for assisting in the biological and social design of MPAs in Oceania? Conventional quadrat field dive surveys were used to measure the accuracy of substrate identification by local informants and a visual survey was used to test hypotheses formulated from local knowledge regarding the spatial distribution and relative abundance of non-cryptic species within certain benthic habitats. Equivalence rates between indigenous aerial photo interpretations of dominant benthic substrates and in situ dive surveys were 75–85% for a moderately detailed classification scheme of the benthos, which included nine locally-defined abiotic and biotic benthic classes for the MPA seabed. Similarly, the taxa inventory showed a strong correspondence between the qualitative predictions of local fisherfolk and the quantitative analysis of non-cryptic species distribution, including their relative abundance and geophysical locations. Indigenous people's predictions about the presence or absence of fish in different benthic habitats corresponded 77% and 92% of the time (depending on scoring schema) with in situ visual measurements. These results demonstrate how incorporating local knowledge of benthic heterogeneity, existing biological communities, and particular spatio-temporal events of biological significance into a GIS database can corroborate the production of scientifically reliable base resource maps for designing MPAs in an environmentally and culturally sound fashion. This participatory approach was used to design and then establish MPAs in the Roviana and Vonavona region of the Western Solomon Islands. Under appropriate conditions, interdisciplinary work can complement the design of scientific fishery management and biodiversity conservation prescriptions for coastal Oceania.
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- Date Issued: 2006
Early effects of a community-based marine protected area on the food security of participating households
- Authors: Weiant, Pamela , Shankar, Aswani
- Date: 2006
- Subjects: To be catalogued
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/439084 , vital:73543
- Description: There is general agreement among conservation practitioners that community-based marine protected areas (CB-MPAs) can improve food security in coastal communities. However, little attention has been given to how communities respond to CB-MPAs, particularly how households try to meet their livelihood needs following the establishment of a restrictive management regime. In this paper, we explore the early effects of a CB-MPA geared toward the management of marine resources harvested by women, as measured by perceived income and food availability. We strive to better understand (1) the contribution of women’s fishing activities to livelihood needs, particularly the harvest of blood cockles (Anadara granosa) and mud clams (Polymesoda spp.)(the species under management);(2) differences in how households respond to a CB-MPA; and (3) the relationship between food security and certain aspects of reef health. To illustrate our case, we draw upon our research experience with social and biological impact assessments and our experience in establishing marine protection in the Western Solomon Islands.
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- Date Issued: 2006
Incorporating fishermen’s local knowledge and behavior into geographical information systems (GIS) for designing marine protected areas in Oceania
- Authors: Shankar, Aswani , Lauer, Matthew
- Date: 2006
- Subjects: To be catalogued
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/439109 , vital:73545 , xlink:href="https://doi.org/10.17730/humo.65.1.4y2q0vhe4l30n0uj"
- Description: Drawing on our experience in establishing marine protected areas (MPAs) in the Roviana and Vonavona Lagoons, New Georgia, Solomon Islands, this paper shows how a geographical information system (GIS) database can be used to incorporate sociospatial information, such as indigenous knowledge and artisanal fishing data, along with biophysical and other information to assist in MPA design. We argue that converting peoples’ knowledge and socioecological behavior into geo-spatial data allows researchers to formulate hypotheses regarding human responses to inter- and intra-habitat variability, along with other marine ecological processes, and help in the designing and implementation of resource management strategies in a cost-effective and participatory way, bridging the gap between indigenous and Western cognitions of seascapes. More generally, we show the significance of combining spatial tools, anthropological fieldwork, and social and natural science methods for studying artisanal fisheries with the goal of aiding the design of marine protected areas.
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- Date Issued: 2006
Customary Sea Tenure in Oceania as a Case of Rights-based Fishery Management: Does it Work?
- Authors: Shankar, Aswani
- Date: 2005
- Subjects: To be catalogued
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/439071 , vital:73542 , xlink:href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s11160-005-4868-x"
- Description: This paper outlines the general characteristics of customary sea tenure (CST) in Oceania and identifies areas in which these characteristics overlap with modern rights-based fisheries management systems such as ITQs and CDQs. It also examines the effectiveness of CST regimes at regulating marine resource use and access by focusing on a particular case from the Solomon Islands. The institutional robustness or vulnerability of CST is assessed by examining various performance criteria for two communities in the Roviana Lagoon, Western Solomons. These criteria include people’s (1) settlement patterns in relation to their property, (2) cultural consensus, (3) cultural attitudes with regard to governance and management, and (4) fishing efforts and yields. The results show that a number of historical processes have shaped CST systems into heterogeneous and dynamic institutions, and that CST regimes can vary even on small geographical scales. Understanding the circumstances in which CST regimes are more likely to be successful has facilitated the design and implementation of co-management fishery prescriptions (MPAs) for protecting particular species and habitats in the region. More generally, the paper proposes that by discerning the effectiveness of local governance institutions at regulating resource use and access – taking into consideration that these are embedded in particular historical and political contexts – we can better predict whether or not an introduced fishery management system will work. This knowledge can also assist in designing hybrid management schemes that cross-fertilize community-based management, modern rights-based fishery management (e.g., ITQs and CDQs), and other government regulations. This integration is particularly relevant when these policies are to be implemented in coastal communities that have or have had traditional rights-based fishery management systems of their own and/or are more socio-culturally homogeneous. Given the long history of failed fishery management, it is now of vital importance to design innovative fishery management prescriptions that integrate natural and social science research more comprehensively.
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- Date Issued: 2005
Integrating indigenous ecological knowledge and customary sea tenure with marine and social science for conservation of bumphead parrotfish (Bolbometopon muricatum) in the Roviana Lagoon, Solomon Islands
- Authors: Shankar, Aswani , Hamilton, Richard
- Date: 2004
- Subjects: To be catalogued
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/439945 , vital:73722 , xlink:href="https://doi.org/10.1017/S037689290400116X"
- Description: Indigenous ecological knowledge and customary sea tenure may be integrated with marine and social science to conserve the bumphead parrotfish (Bolbometopon muricatum) in the Roviana Lagoon, Western Solomon Islands. Three aspects of indigenous ecological knowledge in Roviana were identified as most relevant for the management and conservation of bumphead parrotfish, and studied through a combination of marine science and anthropological methods. These were (1) local claims that fishing pressure has had a significant impact on bumphead parrotfish populations in the Roviana Lagoon; (2) the claim that only small bumphead parrotfish were ever seen or captured in the inner lagoon and that very small fish were restricted to specific shallow inner-lagoon nursery regions; and (3) assertions made by local divers that bumphead parrotfish predominantly aggregated at night around the new moon period and that catches were highest at that time. The research supported claims (1) and (2), but did not support proposition (3). Although the people of the Roviana Lagoon had similar conceptions about their entitlement rights to sea space, there were marked differences among regional villages in their opinions regarding governance and actual operational rules of management in the Lagoon. Contemporary differences in management strategies resulted from people's historical and spatial patterns of settlement across the landscape and adjoining seascapes, and the attendant impact of these patterns on property relations. This was crucial in distinguishing between those villages that held secure tenure over their contiguous sea estates from those that did not. Indigenous ecological knowledge served to (1) verify that the bumphead parrotfish was a species in urgent need of protection; (2) explain how different habitats structured the size distribution of bumphead parrotfish; (3) identify sensitive locations and habitats in need of protection; and (4) explain the effect of lunar periodicity on bumphead parrotfish behaviour and catch rates. Secure customary sea tenure identified locations best suited to bumphead parrotfish management programmes, with a greater likelihood for local participation and programme success. The information was used to establish two marine protected areas in the region for bumphead parrotfish conservation.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2004
Scientific evaluation in women’s participatory management: monitoring marine invertebrate refugia in the Solomon Islands
- Authors: Shankar, Aswani , Weiant, P
- Date: 2004
- Subjects: To be catalogued
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/439983 , vital:73725 , xlink:href="https://doi.org/10.17730/humo.63.3.r7kgd4thktmyf7k1"
- Description: This paper summarizes the results of a women’s community-based marine protected area that has been successful in sustaining invertebrate biological resources and in promoting strong community support. We outline the project and the associated biological results, describe the processes involved in attaining a committed level of community participation, and review the lessons learned during the project’s implementation. We attribute the project’s preliminary success—improved shellfish biomass, enhanced local environmental awareness, and the reinvigoration of cultural management practices—to the following factors: 1) the high level of participatory involvement and community leadership; 2) the local perception that shell beds have recovered rapidly and the role that scientific evaluation has played in reinforcing this notion; 3) a research program that is cross-fertilizing indigenous and scientific ecological knowledge; 4) the unique marine tenure system that allows for the project’s development and the area’s policing; and 5) the tangible economic incentives created by the development project, which ultimately empowers local women. We hope that the project’s findings can be generalized to other regions of the world with operational sea-tenure regimes and that it can help to make the establishing of community-based marine protected areas (CBMPAs) across the Pacific region more effective.
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- Date Issued: 2004
The value of many small vs. few large marine protected areas in the Western Solomon Islands
- Authors: Shankar, Aswani , Hamilton, Richard
- Date: 2004
- Subjects: To be catalogued
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/440050 , vital:73731
- Description: Scientists and policy makers are universally promoting marine protected areas (MPAs) as a fisheries and ecosystem management tool. Experts generally agree that MPAs, particularly fully protected “no-take” zones, can enhance spawning stock biomass, allow for larval dispersal and the export of adults to adjacent non-protected areas, maintain species diversity, preserve habitat, and sustain ecosystem function (eg Bergen and Carr 2003; Johnson et al. 1999; Russ and Alcala 1999). In the case of tropical multi-species fisheries, in which absolute yields are difficult to predict and in which there are multiple users and fishing techniques, marine reserves also can act as precautionary tools to prevent overexploitation. Considering that orthodox fisheries management strategies have generally failed to prevent overfishing globally, the inception of MPAs as a management tool is of particular preventive significance (Russ 2002). Proponents of MPAs have broadly debated the appropriate size and number of MPAs that should be established in order to produce what a particular management prescription proposes to deliver. Some scientists argue that for MPAs to be effective they should cover areas in the magnitude of hundreds or even thousands of square miles, depending upon the type of environment (eg Beattie et al. 2002; Man et al. 1995; Walters 2000). Others have suggested that from a fisheries enhancement perspective, many small reserves in a network are preferred over fewer, larger reserves (eg Roberts et al. 2003). Other debates have centred on how much attention should be paid to science-driven vs. stakeholder-driven considerations when designing MPAs (eg Agardy 1997; Alder et al. 2002; Christie et al. 2003; Jones 2002).
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- Date Issued: 2004
Common Property Models of Sea Tenure: A Case Study from the Roviana and Vonavona Lagoons, New Georgia, Solomon Islands
- Authors: Shankar, Aswani
- Date: 1999
- Subjects: To be catalogued
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/439865 , vital:73715 , xlink:href="https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1018727607651"
- Description: In recent decades, Pacific Region indigenous sea tenure regimes have received considerable attention from social scientists who believe thatmarine-localized common entitlements and fishing practices can aid modern littoral fisheries management. The endorsement of sea tenure institutions as managerial tools, however, has proceeded without adequate consideration of their vulnerability to social and economic changes. The general view held by researchers is that Pacific Island Sea tenure regimes are generally undermined by the influence of exogenous forces resulting in an open-access commons. In this article, it is argued that the contemporary transformation of sea tenure regimes emerges not only from exogenous agency, but from a complex set of autochthonous processes. A case study from New Georgia, Solomon Islands, is presented to show how sea tenure regimes can vary within an ethnically and culturally homogeneous region. Three tenure models are presented to show how different pre- and post-European contact regional settlement patterns, localized processes of political expansion and contraction, and dynamic indigenous sociocultural principles have resulted in institutional differences between each sea tenure model. The effect of the market economy on the organizational structure and managerial outcomes of each model also is discussed.
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- Date Issued: 1999
Patterns of marine harvest effort in southwestern New Georgia, Solomon Islands: resource management or optimal foraging?
- Authors: Shankar, Aswani
- Date: 1998
- Subjects: To be catalogued
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/439971 , vital:73724 , xlink:href="https://doi.org/10.1016/S0964-5691(98)00047-7"
- Description: Numerous researchers in the field of maritime anthropology have accepted the notion that marine tenure institutions are cultural systems designed to conserve marine resources. This idea has attained wide acceptance without the development of an ecological model to account for the occurrence of conservation and/or depletion of resources. In this study, foraging theory is offered as an alternative theoretical framework to examine the diversity of human resource exploitation strategies in coastal ecosystems. The results generated by the foraging models are considered here in relation to their significance in linking ecological evolutionary approaches in anthropology with coastal resource management.
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- Date Issued: 1998
The Tongan maritime expansion: A case in the evolutionary ecology of social complexity
- Authors: Shankar, Aswani , Graves, Michael
- Date: 1998
- Subjects: To be catalogued
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/440025 , vital:73729
- Description: The evolution of the Tongan maritime empire, involving both the development of social complexity and geographic expansion through conquest and trading, are examined by means of evolutionary ecology. This Darwinian evolutionary framework provides the mechanism and identifies the environmental structure, processes, and behavioral strategies by which to account for the geographic and temporal pattern of change in Tonga and related islands. Both ethnohistorical and archaeological data are employed in this analysis, showing how both may reveal overlapping aspects of historical change. The results of this research highlight the importance not only of competition but also of cooperative strategies in the evolution of social complexity and the process of geographic expansion. Key to explaining the evolution of Tongan social complexity are the productive but uncertain environment of Tongatapu, the location of Tongatapu in relation to other islands and prevailing winds, the small landmass of the island, the relatively early integration of the island into a single polity, the creation of collateral ruling lineages, the appropriation of voyaging technology to redirect competition from within Tongatapu to other islands through colonization, aggression, staple and wealth goods trade, and the exchange of spouses.
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- Date Issued: 1998
The use of optimal foraging theory to assess the fishing strategies of Pacific Island artisanal fishers: A methodological review
- Authors: Shankar, Aswani
- Date: 1998
- Subjects: To be catalogued
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/440038 , vital:73730
- Description: Artisanal fisheries play a major role in the social, cultural, and economic life of most Pacific Islanders, particularly in rural communities where people are highly dependent on marine resources for subsistence and commercial purposes. Yet, marine resources are being threatened by pressure from exploding human populations and the increasing commercialisation of the subsistence fishery—circumstances which are now forcing researchers to find novel ways to examine issues of coastal management and marine resource conservation. Among the most recent approaches to coastal management has been to study marine ecological processes in conjunction with those of the contiguous shoreline and upland habitats, or what has been termed Integrated Coastal Zone Management (ICZM). From the standpoint of maritime anthropology, any comprehensive study of the integration of marine and terrestrial biotic components requires the parallel consideration of human activities, including existing property regimes, resource access and distribution rules, and resource exploitation strategies. Although numerous studies have concentrated on the social aspects of Pacific Island artisanal fisheries (eg Johannes, 1981; Hviding, 1996; Lieber, 1994), few have dealt explicitly with the micro-ecology of daily humanmarine interactions (see Aswani, 1997; Bird and Bird, 1997). Such neglect has hampered attempts to fully integrate studies of environmental coastal processes with those of human activities. In this paper, I examine the utility of optimal foraging theory and its methodology, as applied to the study of Pacific Island artisanal fishers. The inclusion of foraging theory can contribute to building a clearer anthropological model to describe the relationship between human foraging and fishery management.
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- Date Issued: 1998
What’s in a name? An analysis of the West Nggela (Solomon Islands) fish taxonomy
- Authors: Shankar, Aswani
- Date: 1998
- Subjects: To be catalogued
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/440074 , vital:73733
- Description: Accurate knowledge about the behaviour, biology and ecology of organisms comprising marine fisheries is a vital prerequisite for their management. Before beginning any study on local knowledge of marine fauna, a working knowledge of their local names must be obtained. Moreover, a great deal of local knowledge can often emerge in the very process of obtaining names (Ruddle, 1994). A detailed treatment of the local naming system of West Nggela marine fauna is given in this paper.
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- Date Issued: 1998
Troubled waters in south-western New Georgia, Solomon Islands: Is codification of the commons a viable avenue for resource use regularisation
- Authors: Shankar, Aswani
- Date: 1997
- Subjects: To be catalogued
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/440061 , vital:73732
- Description: In recent decades there has been a growing interest in indigenous sea tenure institutions and their possible role in establishing a framework for sustainable resource use and conservation. Yet the feasibility of these institutions to cope with social and economic changes have been seldom explored. In this paper a case study is presented where internal deregularisation of the ‘commons’ is the result of existing socio-cultural principles combined with outside influences. Two territorial models are compared to elucidate emerging internal instabilities of sea tenure institutions and possible ways to correct existing problems. The codification of the commons is suggested here as a possible measure to strengthen indigenous common property regimes.
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- Date Issued: 1997