Indigenous Weather Understanding in Japanese Fishing Communities

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Giovanni Bulian
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Values ◽  
Cultural Practices ◽  
Weather Conditions ◽  
Fishing Communities ◽  
Small Scale ◽  
Cultural Tradition ◽  
Small Scale Fisheries ◽  
Global Science ◽  
Selective Incorporation ◽  
Local Weather

Japan is one of the world’s leading marine fishing nations in globalized industrial fisheries, yet the mainstay of the national fishing industry continues to be small-scale fisheries with their own set of cultural and environmental heritage. The cultural tradition of the Japanese fishing communities still preserves the various ways of understanding local weather, which are mainly based on landscape perception and forecasting knowledge. The prediction of weather conditions for a given location and time is part of a long-established historical tradition related to the need for an “easy” understanding of the climatic and maritime environment. It encompasses a variety of practical experiences, skillful reasoning strategies, and cultural values concerning indigenous environmental knowledge, decision-making strategies, and habitual applications of knowledge in everyday life. Japanese traditional forecasting culture interfaces with modern meteorological forecasting technologies to generate a hybrid knowledge, and offers an example of the complex dialogue between global science and local science. Specifically, interpretations and meteorological observations of local weather are modes of everyday engagement with the weather that exhibit a highly nuanced ecological sophistication and continue to offer a critical discourse on the cultural, environmental, and social context of Japanese small-scale fisheries. Indigenous weather understanding is bound up with community-based cultural heritage—religious traditions, meteorological classifications, proverbs, traditional forecasting models, and selective incorporation or rejection of scientific forecasting data—that offers a general overview of the interaction between community know-how, sensory experience, skills, and cultural practices.

scholarly journals The COVID-19 Pandemic, Small-Scale Fisheries and Coastal Fishing Communities

2020 ◽  
Vol 48 (4) ◽  
pp. 336-347 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nathan J. Bennett ◽  
Elena M. Finkbeiner ◽  
Natalie C. Ban ◽  
Dyhia Belhabib ◽  
Stacy D. Jupiter ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Fishing Communities ◽  
Small Scale ◽  
Small Scale Fisheries

Fisheries connectivity measures of adaptive capacity in small-scale fisheries

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Keiko Nomura ◽  
Jameal F Samhouri ◽  
Andrew F Johnson ◽  
Alfredo Giron-Nava ◽  
James R Watson
Keyword(s):  
Adaptive Capacity ◽  
Baja California ◽  
Pacific Coast ◽  
Fishing Communities ◽  
Small Scale ◽  
Small Scale Fisheries ◽  
Income Sources ◽  
The Pacific ◽  
Network Metrics ◽  
Coast Region

Abstract Small-scale fisheries (SSFs) around the world are increasingly facing pressures from a range of environmental, economic, and social sources. To sustain SSFs, it is imperative to understand how fishing communities adapt to these pressures. In particular, to manage economic risks fishers often catch many different species; diversifying harvest portfolios creates multiple income sources in case one species becomes less abundant, less valuable, or otherwise unavailable. Here, we apply fisheries connectivity network analysis to assess the portfolios and potential adaptive capacity of small-scale fishing communities in the Baja California Peninsula (BCP), Mexico. We found that network metrics like modularity and density varied by region and through time. The Pacific coast region of Baja California displayed increasingly modular fisheries connectivity networks, indicating fisheries landings became increasingly asynchronous with each other and the potential adaptive capacity increased. The remaining three regions of Baja California showed the opposite trend, where the temporal covariance between fisheries increased over time. Overall, this study shows that the potential adaptive capacity of fishing communities varies substantially throughout the BCP, and highlights how fisheries connectivity networks can offer a way to quantify and advance our understanding of adaptive capacity within small-scale fishing communities.

scholarly journals Perceived Vulnerability and Climate Change Impacts on Small-Scale Fisheries in Davao Gulf, Philippines

2021 ◽  
Vol 8 ◽  
Author(s):  
Edison D. Macusi ◽  
Kezia L. Camaso ◽  
Anna Barboza ◽  
Erna S. Macusi
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Invasive Species ◽  
Critical Role ◽  
Climate Change Impacts ◽  
Fishing Communities ◽  
Small Scale ◽  
Catch Per Unit Effort ◽  
Credit Access ◽  
Small Scale Fisheries ◽  
Impacts Of Climate Change

The small-scale fisheries play a critical role in food security and income of coastal fishing communities. However, climate variability and its impacts are affecting fishers, their communities, and fishing grounds. This study aimed to determine the perceived impacts of climate change and vulnerability of small-scale fisheries in selected fishing communities around the Davao Gulf. A semi-structured questionnaire was used to gather data on the perceptions of fishers (N = 220) on the impacts of climate change on their livelihood and communities. Seven focus groups corroborated the collected data and conclusions reached (N = 15). Principal component analysis (PCA) was used to reduce the sources of vulnerability and number of impacts of climate change. Regression was used to determine factors influencing the catch per unit effort (CPUE). The PCA results showed that for the vulnerability, the sources, coral bleaching, inadequate food, lack of credit access, changes in weather pattern and hotter temperature contributed highly. For the climate change impacts, the factors, less seasonality, unclear reproductive patterns, diseases in the catch, invasive species, decrease in catch and venturing farther to fish offshore were substantially influential. Further analysis showed that disease and invasive species, decrease in fish catch, fishing farther offshore, and monthly income affected the CPUE of the fisheries. Recommendations for climate change vulnerability reduction based on the conclusions reached in this study include more financial credit access, apprehension of illegal fishers, increased capacity building and technical skills for coastal communities, supplemental livelihoods, and information dissemination on climate change adaptation strategies.

scholarly journals Climate Change Impacts on a Tropical Fishery Ecosystem: Implications and Societal Responses

2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (19) ◽  
pp. 7970
Author(s):  
Mohammad Mahmudul Islam ◽  
Naimul Islam ◽  
Ahasan Habib ◽  
Mohammad Mojibul Hoque Mozumder
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Extreme Events ◽  
Bay Of Bengal ◽  
Time Series Data ◽  
Secondary Data ◽  
Weather Conditions ◽  
Series Data ◽  
Fishing Communities ◽  
Small Scale ◽  
Impacts Of Climate Change

The present study aimed to map out the current threats and anticipated impacts of climate change on the most important hilsa shad (Tenualosa ilisha) fishery and the associated fishing communities based on fieldwork in six coastal fishing communities. To collect empirical data, individual interviews, focus group discussions, oral history, and key informant interviews were conducted. To supplement the empirical findings, time-series data of cyclones and sea-borne depressions in the Bay of Bengal were also analyzed. Analysis of secondary data regarding climate change-induced events and regional studies suggested that the biophysical conditions of the Bay of Bengal are likely to be aggravated in the future, potentially causing more frequent extreme events and affecting the livelihoods of coastal fishing communities in Bangladesh. The fisher respondents revealed that the main target hilsa shad fishery is particularly vulnerable to climate change in terms of alterations to migration patterns and breeding and growth performance. The fishers reported constant climate-related risks because they live in seafront locations, exposed to extreme events, and their occupation entails risky sea fishing. Fishers claimed that they often need return to the coast due to unsuitable weather conditions related to cyclones and frequent tropical depressions, which can cause financial losses or even causalities. Such events negatively affect fishers’ livelihoods, and wellbeing. To cope with the impacts of climate change the fishers have adopted various strategies at both sea fishing and household levels. However, these strategies only support the fishers in terms of immediate survival; they are not enough for long-term resilience. To improve the resilience of the hilsa fishers, the study argues for the implementation the Small-Scale Fisheries Guidelines (SSF Guidelines), which call for longer-term development goals, including in the immediate relief phase, and rehabilitation, reconstruction, and recovery to reduce vulnerabilities to climate and anthropogenic risks.

scholarly journals Northern fisheries: managing income, nutrition and cultural values

Polar Record ◽  
2014 ◽  
Vol 50 (4) ◽  
pp. 338-342
Author(s):  
Maria Nakhshina ◽  
Franz Krause
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Values ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Research Policy ◽  
Large Degree ◽  
Small Scale ◽  
Science And Policy ◽  
Fish Stocks ◽  
Small Scale Fisheries ◽  
Fishery Science ◽  
Vessel Capacity

Fishing is a key livelihood for many people worldwide, and significantly contributes to global nutrition. However, there is an awareness of a widespread crisis in fisheries with profound ecological, social and cultural impacts (Urquhart and others 2013). The majority of people dependent on fishing are involved in small-scale fisheries, which stands in contrast to the narrow focus of most fishery science and policy on large-scale, capital intensive fishing (Berkes and others 2001). Small-scale fisheries require different approaches for research, policy and management, due to their specific technological, economic and sociocultural characteristics that differ from those of large-scale fisheries, as well as a large degree of internal diversity in terms of fish stocks, fishers’ backgrounds, vessel capacity, etc (see Afterword of this collection of papers).

Hopscotch Modernism: On Everyday Life and the Blurring of Art and Social Science

2006 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 70-79 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ben Highmore
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Social Science ◽  
Everyday Life ◽  
Systematic Study ◽  
Cultural Practices ◽  
Health Centre ◽  
Small Scale ◽  
Modernist Literature ◽  
The Everyday ◽  
Point Of Departure

From a remarkably innovative point of departure, Ben Highmore (University of Sussex) suggests that modernist literature and art were not the only cultural practices concerned with reclaiming the everyday and imbuing it with significance. At the same time, Roger Caillois was studying the spontaneous interactions involved in games such as hopscotch, while other small scale institutions such as the Pioneer Health Centre in Peckham, London attempted to reconcile systematic study and knowledge with the non-systematic exchanges in games and play. Highmore suggests that such experiments comprise a less-often recognised ‘modernist heritage’, and argues powerfully for their importance within early-twentieth century anthropology and the newly-emerged field of cultural studies.

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