Lack of interest or capacity of community members to form a CMA
One of the major challenges of forming a CMA is a lack of interest or capacity of members to engage in the formation of a collaborative management structure. Competing interests, a lack of remuneration, disagreement over priorities, conflicts over resource management and hesitation from marginalised groups such as women to participate in the enforcement of rules are some of the issues that can discourage community members from engaging with each other. Integrating existing local approaches to management structures to co-management is one way to encourage interest in CMA formation, as well as ensuring that community members are aware of the mutual benefits of CMAs, using examples of success stories in similar areas.
In cases where marginalised groups such as women do not feel comfortable in playing an active role in enforcement of the rules, it would be important to look to offer training on how to participate, to engage the community broadly on the importance of women’s role in marine management, to explore barriers to enthusiastic participation and/or to find other areas of decision-making that they would feel comfortable participating in, such as the process of instituting the rules and regulations. Ultimately, the community has to be interested and capable in engaging with an external entity to form a CMA, and this should be taken into consideration when identifying a community with which to work.
Conflict resolution
In bringing together different representatives of the fish value chain, there is potential for conflicting needs and priorities related to resources, fishing rights, and other issues. Conflict management and resolution in fisheries is a vital resource dedicated to fostering harmony, cooperation, and resilience within fishing communities and co-management associations through the use of dialogue, consensus-building, and peace process strategies.
Conflicts within fishing communities can stem from a range of issues, and are likely to increase in the face of declining fish populations and the strain this puts on fishing groups. They can be both recent or deep-rooted, occurring within a broader set of social relations that may not be immediately obvious to those tasked with resolving them. They may also be between individual members of a community, or between social groups - for example migrant fishers against locals.
CMA structures empower fishers and association members, regardless of gender, to navigate and resolve conflicts effectively, thereby contributing to effective co-management and enhanced community cohesion within the fisheries sector. Drawing upon their core principles of participatory governance, CMAs must endeavour to give sufficient opportunity for all sides of a conflict to clearly, and without fear of reprisal, communicate their grievances. Similarly, CMA members must ensure that potential biases and conflicts of interest that may arise based on the parties involved are identified and mitigated.
Communities may have established protocols for addressing conflicts, which can inform CMA conflict resolution procedures. However, there are also a number of useful tools online that can guide organisations on how to manoeuvre community conflicts (particularly those around natural resources governance), including guides produced by the FAO (including the VGGT and VGSSF guidelines) and other organisations such as MRAG and the Community-Led Alliance.
Corruption
Any organisation established to manage resources will encounter the risk of corruption, as competition over organisational priorities, resource ownership and governance arises. This could be CMA members conducting IUU fishing, taking bribes to hide illicit fishing, or otherwise failing to uphold the democratic and equitable principles of the CMA, may that be through actions relating to election processes, finances or other key pillars. It is vital that CMAs uphold the greatest standard of transparency. This includes multi-stakeholder participation in decision-making committees, accountability and transparency in financial reporting, as well as the documentation and reporting of stakeholders committing offences.
Durability of CMAs
There remain key challenges to the durability of CMAs, including poverty, illiteracy and a lack of continued engagement for supporting organisations. Implementing practitioners need to ensure ongoing engagement with the CMA beyond the initial formation phase. This support is essential to better understand the factors that determine uptake and ongoing implementation of relevant processes. Practitioners should also ensure follow-up action with the competent authorities, with the potential provision of incentives and other benefits to encourage community members to continue engaging with the CMA. Practitioners should also explore funding avenues for co-management activities and to cover costs associated with the running of associations.
Exclusion of marginalised groups from decision-making
Decision-making in the fisheries sector, and more broadly across society, has often failed to take into account the needs and priorities of marginalised members of society. CMAs seek to change the traditional structure and empower all participants in the fish value chain, encompassing representatives including fishers, processors and sellers and those in supporting roles such as boat builders. In order to ensure traditionally marginalised groups such as women, Indigenous groups, and ethnic minorities are included in the decisions that affect their livelihoods, both a stakeholder and network analysis should be undertaken in order to tailor the toolkit for the specific needs of the host-community. Gender inclusivity should be a major component of the awareness activities, as well as any other important marginalised groups relevant to the specific community.
