Restoring the chambo in Southern Malawi: Learning from the past or re-inventing the wheel?

Chambo is an important fish to Malawi's economy and to the livelihoods of local people in the southern end of Lake Malawi. Overexploitation of the chambo has been a source of concern since the 1930s. The biological and economic collapse of the fishery in Lake Malombe and the Upper Shire River in the early 1990s, and growing evidence in recent years of its decline in the Southeast Arm of Lake Malawi (the major productive area for the species) have galvanised the Government of Malawi into making an attempt to restore the chambo to former levels of production.

This paper argues that while the proposed solutions for restoring the chambo might be well intentioned, they nevertheless ignore existing knowledge and scholarship about fisheries management in African freshwater lakes gathered over the last six decades. A body of knowledge on the biological and scientific basis for regulating the chambo already exists. The missing link is an understanding and appreciation of the social, economic, political and institutional drivers on exploitation patterns of the chambo. Future management solutions must be based on the collective concerns of all potential users. More specifically, such solutions should be cognisant of local knowledge, fishers' experiences and the way they view and define their problems. If these are disregarded, finding solutions to the enormous challenge of restoring chambo stocks to their former status will be as difficult as grappling in the dark.

Keywords:

• restoration
• existing knowledge
• stakeholder involvement

Acknowledgements

The research under the author's Ph.D. was funded by the Norwegian Council of Universities (NUFU). I am grateful to the two anonymous reviewers for their constructive comments that enabled me to improve and strengthen this paper. An earlier draft of this paper was presented at the Chambo Restoration Planning Workshop held at Boadzulu Lakeshore Resort, Mangochi, Malawi from 13–16 May 2003.

Notes

¹Chambo is a general local name for three closely related species of tilapine cichlids (namely Oreochromis squamipinnis, Oreochromis lidole and Oreochromis karongae).

²Here, I refer to the Southeast Arm of Lake Malawi, the Upper Shire River and Lake Malombe as the ‘southern aquatic system’, because the three are ecologically and economically linked.

³Relevant studies or reports on the chambo fishery include Trewavas (1942); Lowe (1952); Williamson's (1966) assessment of the data for the years 1946–1966, Tarbit's assessment for the years 1969 to 1973, the UNDP/FAO stock assessment done in 1972–1976, Chaika (1980) on problems of artisanal fisheries management on the South-East Arm, Mkoko (1981) on the status of chambo fishery on the Southeast Arm; Malawi Government/ODA artisanal fisheries assessment project (1989); and the Chambo Fisheries Management Project (Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations — FAO, 1993).

⁴Estimated catch had declined from over 8000 tons in 1982 to about 100 tons in 1997 from Lake Malombe and from about 1200 tons in 1981 to about 0.2 tons in 1997 from the Upper Shire River.

⁵Increase in effort due to increase in number of participants in the fishery.

⁶Increase in effort due to increase in capitalisation of the fishery or improvements in technology.

⁷Trewavas and her team had preceded Lowe in 1939. Unfortunately, their work was disrupted by the Second World War, resulting in the team being unable to fulfil its mandate.

⁸The Act states that it is ‘An Act to provide for the regulation and control of fishing, and for the purchase, sale, marketing, processing, import and export of fish, to provide for the conservation of fish and further to provide for matters incidental to and connected with the foregoing.’

⁹The closed season is meant to protect the chambo and young during the breeding, spawning and brooding season.

¹⁰The term fisherfolk is used to refer to gear owners and their crew members, helpers, traders and other beneficiaries.

¹¹After independence in 1964, the MCP was the only political party in Malawi under the autocratic rule of Dr. Hastings Kamuzu Banda.

¹²PMF is the paramilitary unit of the Malawi Police force. It was intended to be used for problems such as riot control.

¹³By this time, it had been realised though that the multi-species character of the fishery warranted taking into account the other major stocks involved. An attempt was also made to look at the socio-economic aspects of the exploitation of the chambo.

^adata for 1982, 1987 and 1997 not available.

^bdata on number of gear owners and assistants for 1998 not available.

¹⁴Traditionally, the chilimira is used for catching utaka and usipa.

¹⁵There was a twofold increase in the number of crew members (2996 to 8268) in chilimira units in the same period.

¹⁶The village headman's traditional authority does not extend beyond land and is not therefore recognised out on the lake. This authority resides with government. Under the revised act of 1997, such authority can be delegated to local management bodies.