Cesar2000-Economics of Coral Reefs.pdf

Threats perceived to have declined a lot
Threats perceived to have increased a lot
sedimentation/
deforestation 3%
mining 3%
sedimentation/deforestation 3%
mining 9%
overfishing 17%
overfishing
38%
destructive fishing
11%
destructive
fishing 56%
others 14%
others 21%
Figure 6. Distribution of types of threats by perceived trend.
pollution 23%
cultural obligations, such as the custom at some sites of
giving turtles to traditional chiefs. The study also found
that in general, simple rules (e.g., a ban on dynamite
fishing) appeared to enjoy greater perceived compliance
than more complex arrangements (e.g., a ban on harvesting
trochus between January and May).
3.4 Perceived Trends in Threats
to Coastal Resources
Out of 377 perceptions of trends in threats to coastal
resources, 50 percent perceived threats as having increased
over the past decade, while 37 percent perceived
a decrease. There were also significant differences in
local perceptions according to the type of threat (table
3). Pairwise comparisons indicated that pollution was
perceived as having increased more quickly than other
threats, while destructive fishing practices were believed
to have declined the most (figure 6). 8 Destructive fishing
practices did not include cyanide fish poisoning, which
was not reported at the study sites.
In general, respondents felt that destructive fishing and
certain types of overfishing could be handled by the community.
Outside help was believed necessary in dealing with
pollution, overfishing by outsiders, and other threats such
8
The Mann-Whitney rank test was significant at the 5 percent level
(Siegel & Castellan 1988).
as dredging, construction of causeways, and drilling for oil.
Sites in Samoa and Tonga differed substantially in their
views of the degree to which communities could handle
threats. Respondents in Tonga, where there is an open
access system, felt local communities could handle only 22
percent of the most important threats and that outside support
was required for as many as 72 percent. By contrast,
sites in Samoa, where a recent community-based management
program was introduced, felt that the communities
could handle 61 percent of the threats, and that the remaining
could be handled through a mixture of community
and outside help (Samoan sites were smaller, however).
3.5 Factors Influencing Perceived Success
Table 5 on next page shows the results of the econometric
analysis for factors affecting perceived success.
With the exception of the CpUE model, the results indicate
a reasonable fit for a cross-sectional dataset. The significance
of ‘natural disasters’ in explaining perceived CpUE
and habitat trends is consistent with the rapid resource recovery
which typically follows a cyclone event. ‘Quality
of leadership’ appears to be important in controlling perceived
threats. 9 Consistent with the findings of the nonparametric
statistics, the presence of ‘pollution’ seems to have
9
Sites with sound leadership also tended to have moderately higher
perceptions of reef finfish CPUE and reef habitat trends. For details,
see World Bank (2000a).
A COMPARATIVE STUDY OF SOCIO-ECONOMIC AND MANAGEMENT ISSUES RELATED TO COASTAL RESOURCES IN THE PACIFIC ISLANDS
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