David Wardell
Small-scale fisheries feed millions and employ more than 60 million people worldwide. Yet they’re often treated as a single uniform group, when in reality, they’re as diverse as the ecosystems and communities they support.
In a new Nature Food commentary, WorldFish scientists Michelle Tigchelaar and Marleen Schutter discuss recent global research informed by findings from the Illuminating Hidden Harvests initiative, that identifies five archetypes of small-scale fisheries, from individual coastal gleaners to offshore fishing fleets.
They highlight how this kind of archetyping can make the sector’s diversity more visible and actionable for decision makers, helping design of policies that reflect real differences in scale, technology, and contributions to sustainable development.
But they also note that small-scale fishing is far richer than any framework can fully capture and that real progress towards transforming food systems will be driven by inclusive decision making in which small-scale fishers themselves co-design what the future looks like.