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First Person
Modifications to fishing
techniques improve
livelihood of locals
Community Fisheries Net Bigger Catches
Photo: Lécio Munguambe, WWF
These young girls in Monrovia, Liberia
received scholarships from USAID and
the US Ambassador to Liberia.
António João Cecílio Mtambo is a fisherman from the
community of Chuanga in Lake Niassa who used to depend on
ineffective fine-meshed fishing nets that provided little
sustenance for his family. “I used to struggle to provide for my
family. The situation here was so bad that one could stand for
hours in the lake and find nothing,” said Mtambo.
Since 2006, USAID and the World Wildlife Fund have been
working to establish the Lake Niassa Reserve and have helped
create 11 community fishing councils. Mtambo belongs to a
group of patrol officers who enforce the recommended fishing
net sizes and prevent the lake’s resources from being depleted.
With the councils in place, these communities have decided to
ban all mosquito net fishing to preserve the fish in Lake Niassa.
As a result, communities around the lake are beginning to
prosper, and the size and quality of catch has increased
considerably. With fine-meshed nets, fishermen caught fish with
an average size of three to five inches. Now, they regularly reel
in fish that are up to 12 inches long.
Lake Niassa is the world’s ninth largest lake and widely
recognized as the most biologically important lake in the world.
It is home to over 1,000 fish species—95 percent of them
endemic to the lake—including tilapia, lake salmon, and
hundreds of species of cichlids. Yet, fishing communities live
well below the official poverty line and the lake’s fisheries are
under threat from overfishing.
One of the biggest problems facing Lake Niassa communities
had been the use of donated mosquito nets, intended to protect
against malaria but used for fishing instead. Mosquito net
fishing was harmful because it removed all sizes of fish, fry, and
even eggs from the lake. The nets were destroying the algae, a
vital part of the lake’s food chain, and further damaging fish
stocks.
Mtambo now provides enough for his family, and he brings in
enough fish to sell in the nearby Lichinga market. “It’s like
magic has happened. We catch fish big enough for ourselves
and to sell in big markets. This year, I managed to buy three
new nets with money generated from the fish.”
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