Water-Energy-Food Nexus Part 6: Xiao Recio-Blanco

Description

Join us for part 6 of the Water-Energy-Food Nexus where we will hear from Xiao Recio-Blanco, director of the ocean program at the Environmental Law Institute. At this webinar, Recio-Blanco will discuss the Small-Scale Fisheries Regulatory Toolkit.

About 90% of the world's 120 million capture fishers are involved in small-scale fishing (SSF), making SSF the largest creator of marine jobs. Seeking to provide guidance on how to promote a more sustainable SSF sector, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations published the Voluntary Guidelines for Sustainable Small-Scale Fisheries. Building on the connection between environmental sustainability and human rights in the small-scale fisheries context, the Environmental Law Institute developed the Small Scale-Fisheries Law and Governance Toolkit. The toolkit identifies useful regulatory approaches for SSF governance and model legal language. Many fisheries laws have inserted the concept of "sustainability" without elaborating on how to translate that concept into governance institutions and regulatory procedures. The toolkit focuses on creating and implementing fisheries co-management systems, along with two basic governance elements that strengthen co-management: exclusive fishing rights for SSF communities and the creation of exclusive zones for SSF.

Developing model legal language, however, is only one small step. For any policy to be successfully translated into regulatory action, lawmakers need to be knowledgeable about the challenges and opportunities of SSF governance – which is often not the case.