Indigenous Peoples and Conservation Organizations

The Foi in Papua New Guinea 103
A pair of trained observers was stationed at each
observation point or canoe landing site to ensure
that all catches were recorded. The observers
noted the times of departure and arrival of all
canoes in the area. When a canoe returned, the
observers asked permission to examine the catch
and interview the men or women who had done
the fishing.
The following kinds of information were
documented:
• Catch composition was determined by noting
the number and type of each fish or
crayfish caught, and identifying it by its
Foi name or English common name;
• The total weight of the catch by species,
including, where possible, individual
weights and lengths;
• The number of hours people spent fishing
was determined by interviewing the leader of
each fishing trip to see if other activities had
occurred, such as bamboo collecting or gardening,
and subtracting the time devoted to
secondary activities from the canoe’s departure–return
log on the monitoring sheet;
• The gender and age distribution of people
doing the fishing was loosely defined as
men, boys, women, and girls (the age distinctions
were somewhat subjective, but
women and men were generally those who
were married or of a marriageable age); the
leader’s name was also recorded, to help
keep track of gill net owners;
• The destination of the catch was noted to
determine whether it was for home consumption
or sale;
• The fishing gear and/or fishing method
used were noted, including separate notations
for fishing and crayfishing equipment,
and the mesh size of gill nets;
• The fishing site was recorded, using the Foi
place names, to determine the intensity of
fishing at each site; distances to the site
were added later using CAMRIS, a geographic
information systems tool.
For a variety of reasons, as in cases of people
camping out overnight at bush huts, not all
catches could be monitored. Wherever possible,
fishermen whose catch could not be viewed
directly were interviewed either the same day or
the day after to gather data. The observers also
recorded weather conditions and any other factors
that might influence the amount of time spent
fishing on a particular day, noting holidays, market
days, community work days, church days, and
compensation claim days on the record sheets.
The subsistence fish catch monitoring program
produced a vast amount of data, and will provide
ample baseline data against which to compare
changes in the future. There were several
key findings.
First, the fishery was found to be far more significant
to the community than first thought. The
annual catch for the entire lake was estimated to
be 70.1 tons/annum. This is equivalent to
164,941.2 tins (425-g mackerel tins) of fish per
year. The cheapest brand at the Moro trade store
in 1997 was K2.20 per tin, so the replacement
value of fish to the lake communities would be
K362,870.59 per year. The resource is economically
important to the lake people.
Second, a total of 2,143 crayfish and 1,259 fish
were caught per day by the five villages, and
approximately 2,118,460 crayfish and 1,244,285
fish were caught per year. This is an extremely
large number and highlights the highly productive
nature of the lake.
Third, the mean catch weight/person/day for all
five villages was 121.2 g/day. This is much
higher than that reported for a number of other
Pacific Islands such as the Solomons (63–78
g/day), Tigak Island, PNG (24 g), West New
Britain (11 g), and Western Samoa (27–69 g).
Fourth, a total of 19 species of fish and crustaceans
were recorded in the catch. When the data for all
villages was pooled, three of the species contributed
80 percent of the total catch weight: crayfish, or
Cherax papuanus (35 percent); Adamson’s grunter,
or Hephaestus adamsoni (23 percent); and fimbriate
gudgeon, or Oxyeleotris fimbriata (22 percent).
Fifth, fish were caught by a variety of methods,
including more traditional methods such as poisoning
with plant extracts such as Derris.
However, pooled data for the five villages showed,
in descending order, that hand lining (30 percent),
mixed fishing using hand lines and catching crayfish
by hand (24 percent), spearing (17 percent),
and gill netting plus mixed gill netting (17 per-