We hope that you have enjoyed our ‘Gender equality and empowerment’ blog series and are pleased to welcome you to the final post of the series. If you would like to read the entire series, you can follow these links for the first and second blog posts.

In our final post we feature the Marine Ambassadors programme introduced by SEED Madagascar. This programme works to empower female community members in Anosy to take more of an active role in the management of the lobster fisheries that they are reliant on.

Empowering women in community-based fisheries management in Madagascar

In the remote coastal communities of Anosy, southeastern Madagascar, fishing provides a vital source of nutrition and income where few livelihood alternatives exist. For example, in the community of Sainte Luce, 83% of households are dependent on lobster fishing as their main source of income. However, the local lobster stock is declining as a consequence of overfishing, which is threatening livelihoods, food security, and biodiversity.

SEED Madagascar is working to identify a sustainable solution through Project Oratsimba. Working with local fishers in the three rural communities of Sainte Luce, Elodrato, and Itapera in rural Anosy, the project supports community-based, sustainable lobster fishery management designed to increase both income and food security.

The main catch – a spiny lobster, Credit – SEED Madagascar

As part of the project, SEED aims to increase recognition of the important role women play in fisheries management, shedding light on the crucial contribution to lobster fishing made by local women in Anosy. Based on traditional gender roles, men and women carry out different tasks related to lobster fishing. Without the combined efforts of both men and women, the lobster fishing supply chain would be severely disrupted. Despite this, there remains a lack of understanding of the critical role that women play.

Lobster catching is performed by men, fishing from hollowed-out canoes called pirogues. However, these fishers use bait that is caught mainly by women, who use river nets or scrape shellfish from shallow rocks off the beach, with the lobster pots themselves often woven by women. On the beach, women collect and weigh the morning’s catch, before the lobsters are passed onto the export companies via local middlemen. In terms of generating household income, credited on the catch itself, the essential roles women carry out are too often overlooked, undervalued, and relegated to part of a woman’s household duties – ultimately undermining their economic contribution. This, coupled with the perception of lobster fishing as “men’s work” by both men and women, has led to women being excluded from the lobster fisheries management process.

Nevertheless, there is a clear demand from local women to engage more actively in decision-making regarding the lobster fisheries management. A female project participant from a fishing household in Elodrato told SEED that “Women should be invited to participate; women should be able stand and talk in front of everyone. Women have different ideas than men.”

A local woman involved in weighing lobsters on the beach, Credit – SEED Madagascar

To empower the women of the target communities, and to encourage them to participate more actively in the management of their fisheries, SEED is training Women Marine Ambassadors. The training is focused on increasing confidence and improving public speaking skills of the Ambassadors, as well as their knowledge of community-based fisheries management.

The training aims to impart the Ambassadors with the knowledge and skills necessary to inspire other women in their community. After completing their training, the Ambassadors will lead women-only education sessions on fisheries management, instilling the confidence required to have a stronger voice in fishery management decision-making.

Through shedding light on the essential roles women play in the lobster fishing supply chain, this project hopes that others will be empowered to become more actively involved in community-based fisheries management.

For more information on project 25-016 led by SEED Madagascar please click here. To read the full article from this project and others that were featured in our ‘Gender equality and empowerment’ edition of the Darwin Newsletter, please click here.