Towards regulating the use of beach seines in Benin: a participatory experience

A. Gbaguidi, Biologist, Centre for Fisheries and Oceanological Research, Benin

The fishing technique known as beach seining has been strongly denounced by fisheries administrators and ecologists for its destructive effect on fisheries resources, particularly juveniles of coastal species. Both the fisheries communities and the fisheries administrations of Benin, Togo and Ghana are aware of the problem. However, what should they do? Should the use of beach seine nets be banned? This would make life worse for the communities. Another solution would be to pave the way for regulations to restrict the practice and protect coastal stocks. This article describes what is happening in Benin after two years’ activities on a community project to regulate the mesh size of beach seine nets.

It is 6 am on Tuesday 11 November 2003 in Aïdo beach near Ouidah in Benin. A canoe takes off to sea with its crew of eight and a beach seine net. The net is attached to the beach by long ropes, and will be cast into the water about 800 meters from the shore. Everyone hopes there will be a good catch today, although that is not the case every day.

The net is cast and the hauling begins. Two groups of fishers, both men and women, standing about 600 m apart, haul the fish caught to shore. As the net is pulled, the two groups gradually draw closer to each other and their songs would seem to augur a good catch. Women who are not helping with the hauling bring water for the others and coil the rope. They will also be the ones to take the fish to where they will be sorted into species, measured and weighed. Each time the seine goes out, two fisher-enumerators and two biostatisticians help the fishers to measure and weigh their catch, and note the statistics. Robert Gbaguidi, one of the biostaticians, who is living among the Aïdo beach communities, makes sure that the job is done properly, to produce a proper assessment of the community project begun in July 2002 to test a new beach seine with a larger mesh than the nets currently used along the coast of Benin, Togo and Ghana. One of the objectives of this project, which covers all three countries, is to work closely with fisheries dependent communities to reduce the pressure on juveniles in order to ensure the sustainaiblity of the fisheries resources.

A more selective beach seine, but…

It takes three hours to bring the catch ashore. “With the old net, it would have taken us at least five hours,”explains Dovodji Kakpo, president of the Akpéyédjé group which is testing the new seine. According to this heir of a fisherman of Ghanaian origin whose family has lived at Aïdo beach for generations, “Hauling in the old seine (which had a 10 mm mesh bag) took more time and effort because it also caught the small fish which made it heavy. The new seine (20 mm mesh bag) only catches the larger fish. It is better,”declares Dovodji Kakpo. This fact was confirmed by an appraisal conducted by an independent biologist in February 2003. The activities of the two gears were monitored over a period of sixteen months (June 2002 to September 2003). The fish landed by the new and old seines on the same days of the week were fixed at 39.062 kg being a turnover of 6,046,700 FCFA[1], and 33.568 kg fetching 5,769,700 FCFA respectively. The average monthly income for the first gear is 377,900 FCFA, and for the second, 360,600 F. However, the new seine leads to some shortfalls between August and December when the juveniles of some species (especially sardinella, anchovies and shrimps) are caught en masse.

This situation was foreseen when the community project was being formulated. This was why some accompanying measures like the bottom gill net called “Tounga” was introduced. This alternative activity has generated an average monthly income of 131,400 FCFA, being a total monthly income of 509,300 FCFA for the group combining the new seine and the “Tounga” bottom gill net. This combination helps to increase the income of the group slightly.   

With the new seine, the amount of juveniles caught has reduced but fisheries effort has increased. The fact is that because the gear is easier to haul, fishermen tend to use it more frequently. Paradoxically, this increases the risk of pressure on the resources and justifies the need for a global approach in fisheries management.

The fishing over, earnings will now be shared. The fishers who went out to sea receive more than those who stayed on the shore. One third of earnings is allocated for the depreciation of the engine, the seine and the boat. The rest is shared between the crew and those who helped with the hauling. The fish is sold to a group of seven fishmongers. The 21 women of the Akpéyédjé group have divided themselves into three sub-groups of seven fishmongers to buy the fish from the fishers, each in turn. “This internal organisation means that the women can take a fair and active part in the marketing,” explains Mouhounèssi Adji, a fishmonger.

The origins of the beach seine in Benin

The beach seine was introduced in Benin in the town of Grand-Popo by Ghanaian fishermen at the beginning of the last century. It first appeared in the Cotonou zone in 1942 and gradually spread along the coast. Known as Yovodò in Ghana, it is called Aguénin in Benin.

This form of fishing disappeared from Benin’s eastern coast in the 1970s because of the effects of coastal erosion. The trunks of coconut palms knocked by breakers into the sea in this zone which is close to Nigeria, did not make the fishers’ work any easier. The activity still thrives in the west of the country though, where the fishers are mainly Ghanaians and Beninois.

In the past, in all three countries, the beach seine nets were made by the fishers themselves, using a large mesh which let the small fish escape and only caught the larger species. However beach seines today are made by putting together small-meshed nets which gather everything in their path, including the small fish. The constantly increasing pressure on juveniles has, over the years, led to a considerable reduction in the stock of adult fish.

Regulate beach seines

The project was particularly important in Benin because, although the country has a fisheries development plan and regulatory texts, nothing in these specifically mentions beach seines. The only regulation respected by the fishers is customary law, which sets the rest day depending on the place. In the project area, Aïdo beach, the communities have a day of rest every five days.

A feedback workshop to present the results will gather together fishers, locally elected representatives, fisheries department officials, NGOs and development partners at the beginning of 2004. It will offer an opportunity to discuss the experiences and lessons of the community project and to consider which regulations should be adopted to govern the use of the new beach seine in Benin. Césaire Ben Johnson, the Operations Officer of the SFLP National Coordination Unit in Benin has also suggested establishing a flexible regulation covering all the concerns of the fisheries communities.

The fishers say that the new seine stops them from catching prawns, as well as sardinella and anchovies, which are both small in size even when fully grown. These species are in demand from consumers. The president of the Akpéyédjé group says that, “A bowl of anchovies sells for CFA 4,000, compared to CFA 2,000 for other juvenile fish. We are losing out by not being able to catch them with the new seines.” September and December are the peak seasons for anchovies and sardinella. The fishers feel it might be “interesting if future regulations allow them to use the old seine during these two months.” This is a good idea, but how easy will its application be? It will not work unless an awareness-raising campaign is conducted in the communities, backed by with strict monitoring and control of fishing gears by the administration. This is because under the pretext of having forgotten, the fishers may continue to use the 10mm mesh after the anchovy and sardinella season.

Opening the project to other income-generating activities

The new beach seine is certainly profitable. However, the project initiators did not really expect it to be and so had thought of setting up livelihoods diversification activities (related or not to fisheries) to help the communities make up for any possible shortfall resulting from using the new beach seine. This is why the use of the “Tounga” bottom gill net, which has a 65 mm mesh was proposed. This would make it possible to catch tilefish, sole, crab and other larger fish. Unfor-tunately, the fishers say that the results have not been very good. The fish caught spoil, mainly because the net is laid at sea in the evening and taken up the next day. This means that the fish is sold at a very low price. Nevertheless, this problem could be resolved through the introduction of cool boxes on the canoes, and the nets being taken up the same day.

Other activities have proved more profitable especially for the women. One of these is the sale of coconuts in Nigeria for biscuit production. They also farm oysters. Thanks to these new activities, some of them are beginning to amass small amounts of savings. Mouhounèssi Adji confided: “It is easier now for us to cope with our children’s schooling, and health care for ourselves and our children…”.

Regional background of the project

The project to test the new beach seine was set up on the initiative of the fisheries communities and administrations of Ghana, Togo and Benin. In Ghana, the authorities had recommended banning the net, although they did recognise that the beach seine was a significant source of income for the communities concerned. This measure did not seem to be the best since banning beach seines in Ghana, whilst still allowing it in Togo and Benin, would not have produced the desired result. In Togo, the authorities decided not to ban the net, since it is one of the few fishing techniques the fishers knew. The Beninese authorities adopted a similar position. The communities in all three countries accepted the idea of regulating beach seining, on the condition that their opinions be taken into account in any decisions taken.

The project covers all three countries, since a solution restricted to a single country could not solve the problem. The communities in Benin, Togo and Ghana in fact fish from the same stocks, and the fishers have migrated from one country to another for generations. Moreover, a joint project encourages exchanges of experience between the communities and the application in the future of new regulations governing the use of the beach seine.

The Benin experience

To obtain reliable data, the new seine was tested in Benin together with a control, an old-type seine used by a group of fishers about 4 km from the project site. The length of the nets was the same (475 m), the only difference being the mesh size.

In order to tackle the problem of manpower which is often crucial in beach seine, the group benefiting from the community project asked for the help of Ghanaian fishermen who are not members of the group. The first feedback workshop was held in Ouidah April 2003. About 150 people participated. Based on the results, the fishers see the advantages of the new beach seine, but they do not have the money to invest in this more selective fishing gear. “People don’t want to give up their old nets and make new ones because they are very expensive to make,” says the president. He estimates the cost of a beach seine at over 6 million FCFA, which is beyond the reach of the fishers. Basile Apédo, a fisher in the Akpéyédjé group pleads “We would like support from the administration to give us access to the credit institutions, because the banks do not trust us. They say our activities are risky and unreliable”.

The results of the project in Benin show that active involvement from the fishers, strictness in data collection and making the data available to the communities are important factors in the success of this project. The regulation of beach seines and the development of alternative activities will certainly help to improve the living conditions of fishers along the Beninese coast. But there are also other non-fisheries related issues, such as urbanisation and the lack of space because of competition with other coastal activities like tourism, the excavation of sea sand for the construction of infrastructures (buildings, roads, bridges, etc.) or port development, which have a direct effect on the livelihoods of the fisheries communities. Solutions can only come when the integrated development of the coastal zones take the aspirations of the communities who live there into account. One therefore hopes that the synergy created between the administration and the fisheries communities by the project will make the latter strong enough to influence decisions that affect their lives. In any case, the conclusions and recommendations of the Benin project feedback workshop will form a good point of reference for Ghana and Togo, and provide food for future discussions between the three countries to help regulate the use of beach seines