Cesar2000-Economics of Coral Reefs.pdf

32
Several efforts along these lines are being pursued by aquaculture
organizations in Southeast Asia and the Indo-Pacific, including the
Network of Aquaculture Centers in the Asia-Pacific (http://
naca.fisheries.go.th/grouper), the Australian Prawn Farmer’s Association,
and the Global Aquaculture Alliance (Boyd, 1999; Phillips,
1999). These industries are working to improve sustainability in general
and to foster responsible aquaculture and consumer awareness of
eco-friendly fishing alternatives.
33
The latter is a potential problem for Taiwan’s current plans to promote
hatchery-rearing of groupers in Taiwan and grow-out operations
in countries such as the Philippines and Micronesia.
sumes large quantities of ‘trash’ fish, involves high mortality
rates and pollutes the environment.
Continued research and the vigorous promotion of
sustainable, hatchery-reared mariculture systems could
change all this. Through a mariculture certification system
(e.g., Sustainable Forestry Council), demand countries
could restrict their purchase of live reef fish to those
mariculture farms which employ ecologically sound best
practices (Rimmer et al. 1997; Clay 1999; Holthus
1999). 32
Making sure that mariculture ventures primarily benefit
local fishing communities could be achieved by focusing
on small, grass-roots level operations in developing
Indo-Pacific countries. A successful role model could be
the seahorse mariculture project in the Philippines
which seeks to promote a sustainable fishery for seahorses
through local education, marine reserves and alternative
income livelihoods (Vincent 1997). This type of small,
localised mariculture system, however, may be more difficult
to create given the high-tech nature and capital
requirements observed for successful grouper mariculture
farms in Taiwan (World Bank, 2000; Rimmer et al.
1997). Trial research in developing countries can be
undertaken to ensure that (i) local fishing communities
are not deprived of employment and income by the
monopolisation of farms by industrialised nations, or
that (ii) not only the more polluting segments of
grouper mariculture (i.e., the grow-out stages) — and
the responsibility for dealing with that pollution — are
transferred from industrialised nations to developing
countries. 33 To avoid these problems, the involvement in
developing supply countries of larger-scale ‘aquabusiness’
from industrialised nations could be predicated on
the establishment of educational and technical assistance
programs and funds to carry out environmental impact
assessments (by independent parties), installation of water
recirculation and/or treatment systems, and creation of
marine closures nearby to mariculture ponds (Phillips
1999).
8. CONCLUSIONS
Since the early 1980s, some of the world’s most precious
living resources have been decimated to supply the trade
in live reef fish. Most recently, within the span of four
years, the trade has swept through innumerable pristine
coral reef ecosystems in the Indonesian archipelago and
out into the western Pacific and Indian Ocean.
The challenge is to stop this destruction while maintaining
valuable grouper fisheries. In the beginning of
this paper, we posed the question: Can the current destructive
practices and unsustainable market for live reef
fish in Southeast Asia be transformed into one that is
both non-destructive and sustainable Our analysis indicates
the answer is yes. Through the numerous actions
discussed in section 7, a marine market transformation
of the LRFT can be achieved through (i) elimination of
cyanide use for wild catch, (ii) prevention of the overfishing
of wild populations, and (iii) stimulation of sustainable
grouper mariculture as an alternative to wild
supply. These options will only work when accompanied
by applied research, strong government commitment
and solid management efforts. The capture of wild juveniles
for grow-out needs to be evaluated further, and the
practice may need to be modified (to take only very
young fish in pre-settlement or early post-settlement
stages) before it can be promoted as a sustainable component
of a MMT. Together, these measures could supply
the market for live reef fish in both sustainable and
non-destructive ways.
Sustainable management of the live reef fish trade
requires active participation on the part of both importing
and exporting economies. However, action to date
has been one-sided, with demand countries, most nota-
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HERMAN S. J. CESAR, KIMBERLEY A. WARREN, YVONNE SADOVY, P. LAU, SIET MEIJER & EKKO VAN IERLAND: