Fisheries in southern Brazil: a comparison of their management and sustainability

Abstract

Defined as operational units, the estuarine and marine fishing production systems (FPS) from the two southernmost states of Brazil, Santa Catarina and Rio Grande do Sul were analyzed using the RAPFISH technique with respect to sustainability of fisheries. The FPS were defined by 49 attributes divided into five fields: economic, social, ecological, technological and managerial. Data were obtained from the literature and interviews with fishers, skippers, and ship owners in 2003 and 2004. Overall, 26 FPS were identified: nine small-scale; three medium-scale; ten large-scale operating on the shelf, upper slope or nearby oceanic waters; and four large-scale fishing systems on the upper slope or neighboring oceanic waters. The latter included only foreign vessels, which produced frozen products exclusively for export. Analyses of 15 selected attributes more closely associated with sustainability in the five fields of evaluation showed all FPS in an intermediate position between the extremes of ideal and bad, reinforcing the perception that no FPS in southern Brazil can be considered truly sustainable; evidence of clearly unsustainable FPS was also not found. Thus RAPFISH fell short of producing a clear pattern that could result in sound management, probably due to disagreement among the different dimensions of sustainability. All five fields of evaluation were equally weighted; however, it could be argued that the biological and ecological status of fisheries were not given enough emphasis in relation to the other dimensions. Dissimilarities within FPS and differences regarding sustainability levels must all be taken into consideration for sound management measures.