Lessons learnt in CBFM-SSEA Sunamganj district Bangladesh

Abstract

In the district of Sunamganj, Bangladesh, the sustainable resource management, which is part and parcel of the Community Based Fisheries Management (CBFM) approach, has led to documented increases in yields as well as returns through reversing environmental degradation, in comparison to the previously existing situation of over-exploitation of fisheries resources. By establishing the Community Based Organisations (CBOs) for management of local water resources, and by formally registering such CBOs within the Government system, grassroots institutions have been created which have successfully exerted their legal rights. Initial revolving grants for payment of the first-year lease fee have proven a justifiable expense in light of the objective of establishing large groups of resource-poor households as sustainable CBOs for fisheries management. By making the processes of cost sharing and revenue distribution transparent for all inside as well as outside the CBOs, planning the management beyond the day-to-day needs has become feasible, as there is now less fear of losing out on one's individual fishing share. Good fisheries management has led to adjusting the number of fishers in relation to the carrying capacity of the water resources; with increasing yields, the pressure from other resource-poor persons on sharing in the fisheries resource can be accommodated by increasing the number of CBO members.