Addressing Illegal, Unreported and Unregulated Fishing as a Governability Problem: A Case Study of Lake Victoria, Tanzania

Suggested Bibliographic Reference: Challenging New Frontiers in the Global Seafood Sector: Proceedings of the Eighteenth Biennial Conference of the International Institute of Fisheries Economics and Trade, July 11-15, 2016. Compiled by Stefani J. Evers and Ann L. Shriver. International Institute of Fisheries Economics and Trade (IIFET), Corvallis, 2016.Proceedings of the Eighteenth Biennial Conference of the International Institute of Fisheries Economics and Trade, held July 11-15, 2016 at Aberdeen Exhibition and Conference Center (AECC), Aberdeen, Scotland, UK.Illegal, Unreported and Unregulated (IUU) fishing is a pervasive practice in small scale fisheries. It affects the ecosystem and the livelihoods of people depended on the fisheries resources. Many times management technical measures from development partners and government have been implemented without success. In this study, we apply governability framework to identify why IUU fishing is persistent in Ijinga Island in Magu district of Lake Victoria Tanzania. First, the study examined the properties of the social and natural systems in Ijinga, as well as the governing system and the interactions between them. Next, we analysed the goodness-of-fit of the governing system in addressing the challenge of IUU fishing. Through interviews with 150 stakeholders using a questionnaire, we learned that IUU fishing is a multifaceted issue with varied perceptions among stakeholders, the system to be governed is too diverse, complex and dynamic for simple solutions such as gear and access restriction, and governing system consists of various institutions that poses governability problem. Therefore in order to address IUU fishing, it is vital to tackle fishers’ livelihoods need and restructure the institutional arrangement to enhance governing capacity