Distant-water fleets, local consequences: lessons from a case study in Liberia

The interactions––including conflict and competition––between coastal small-scale fishing (SSF) communities and large-scale, distant-water fishing (DWF) fleets have garnered increasing attention in recent decades. Coastal States, such as Liberia, employ a variety of access arrangements to license foreign fishing vessels to access fisheries resources within their exclusive economic zones (EEZ). This paper contributes a case study that assesses the socioeconomic impacts of distant-water trawl vessels on Liberia’s SSF and fisheries-dependent coastal communities. Based on quantitative Sea Around Us Project catch and National Fisheries and Aquaculture Authority effort data from 2004 to 2019, triangulated with primary qualitative data from 337 interviews with fishers (n = 169), fishmongers (n = 166), and cold storage employees (n = 2) across every coastal county of Liberia, we found that there is direct resource competition and market interactions between small-scale fishers and the DWF trawl fleet in Liberia. Overall, fish landings by small-scale operators have increased since 2004 and remained relatively steady at around 25,000 tonnes per year, while average catch per vessel has increased by 13.08% overall since 2004, but declined by 3.5% since 2010. Total annual catch for the distant-water trawl fleet has hovered around 75,000 tonnes, while catch per vessel has increased by an average of 59.8% since 2004, and by 77.2% since 2010. Ninety-five percent of fishmongers have seen a decline in fish availability in their communities, coupled with 96% reporting an increase in market price, while catches from the DWF trawlers are rarely available to supplement local food security. These findings underscore the need for holistic fisheries management that matches the multidimensional interactions between SSF and DWF fleets. We conclude by calling for additional research into the effectiveness of preferential access areas (PAAs) for SSF to safeguard the economic, social, and cultural rights of Liberian coastal communities.