Sunday 15 July 2012

Introducing Alternatives to Sea Turtle Fishing in Cuba – via Herp Digest



June 21, 2012 in Eco-Tourism, Marine, Rivers and Watersheds, Species Preservation
BY FERNANDO BRETOS (2011 Kinship Fellow)
By engaging fishing towns at the community level, Fernando and his colleagues are replacing short-term payoffs with more permanent social and economic benefits.
In a recent PBS/Nature documentary, Cuba was coined an “accidental Eden.” Its large size relative to low population, isolation, and a series of progressive environmental legislation passed by the Cuban government in the 1990s has spared many of its coastal resources the same ecological fate as in neighboring Caribbean countries. I have worked in Cuba since 1998, from where my parents departed in 1961. The island country has been close to my heart and the basis for much of my work in conservation. Collaborating with the University of Havana, I have studied and worked to protect Cuba’s sea turtle populations.
Cuba’s 3,000km of coastline provides ample habitat for many species of sea turtles, particularly green, loggerhead, and hawksbill turtles. Sea turtles are enigmatic creatures. Migratory, shy and confined to an oceanic habitat for most of their lives, it is difficult to estimate their true conservation status. Based on historical accounts, including Christopher Columbus’ 15th century voyages to the Americas, hundreds of millions of turtles once nested on Caribbean beaches. Turtle populations have dropped precipitously in the Caribbean as a result of direct poaching of eggs and meat, bycatch, and habitat loss. Cuba’s hawksbill turtles, until recently were the target of government mandated fisheries at two different fishing villages, Cocodrilo on Cuba’s isolated Isle of Youth and Nuevitas on Cuba’s north central coast. Over five hundred animals a year were harvested at these towns since the 1960s, for meat and shell products.
After relenting to constant pressure from the international conservation community, the Cuban government agreed to a full moratorium on this hawksbill harvest in 2008. By shifting from viewing turtles as a marine resource to be exploited for meat and shell alone to one that can serve longer term economic needs such as tourism, the future of sea turtles in the region is bright.
While successful in increasing local hawksbill populations, the elimination of the fishery at Cocodrilo left many Cocodrilo fishermen facing an uncertain future. Founded in 1904, Cocodrilo is an isolated fishing community of 311 residents. Until recently it was known as Jacksonville, in honor of its founder William Hawkins Jackson, a turtle fishermen from the Cayman Islands. Since its founding, generations of English speaking Cocodrilo fishermen made their living hunting sea turtles with the backing of the Cuban government who paid them for their catch. The moratorium on the sea turtle harvest left many fishermen without a livelihood and facing a turning point. How do they preserve their culture and continue their livelihoods while protecting these animals?
In 2009, I reached out to Grupo Tortuguero (GT), a community activism group in Mexico’s Baja California peninsula that developed a successful model to engage similar fishermen. Mexico shares a similar relationship with sea turtles. Until the Mexican government banned the fishing and poaching of sea turtles in 1990, many fishing villages in Baja depended on sea turtles for protein. As with Cocodrilo, these fishermen faced the difficult dilemma of how to feed their families once the Mexican ban was implemented. A group of conservationists, biologists, and fishermen formed GT as a community model to engage fishermen in alternatives to turtle fishing such as eco-tourism, research, and conservation. GT’s flagship outreach programs are festivals during which fishing towns that once targeted sea turtles hold their own community-wide celebrations to honor their relationship to these sentinel creatures.
My Mexican colleagues and I convened the first-ever Cuba-US-Mexico fisherman’s exchange on the Isle of Youth in April 2009 which provided a unique forum for Mexican and Cuban fishermen to discuss ways to reduce sea turtle mortality through their fishing activity.  The successful sea turtle exchange and workshop created considerable momentum within Cuba to provide alternatives for fishermen.
One of the proposed measures announced during the 2009 workshop was to provide continued outreach that engages all facets of the community, including fishermen, women, and children in understanding the ecological and financial benefits of protecting turtles. This would take the form of a sea turtle festival in Crocodrilo featuring music, lectures, workshops, and children’s activities that revolve around the conservation of natural resources. Fishermen would learn how eco-tourism based on turtle encounters, such as when they nest on beaches, could provide an attractive alternative to hunting these charismatic creatures.
The first festival took place from November 18-19, 2011 in Cocodrilo. The event featured educational workshops for adults and children, a forum for local fishermen to express their inherent points of view about harvesting sea turtle, and music and poetry about marine conservation by local artists. The entire community of Cocodrilo, led by its mayor, Evelio Lavadie Montpelier have taken full ownership in hosting subsequent events. The Ocean Foundation and GT recently completed the Second Annual Cocodrilo Sea Turtle festival from May 18-21, 2012. One of the concepts discussed at this festival was the need to encourage sustainable tourism to this rustic fishing community. This new type of tourism would provide alternative income to the community, particularly those who do not rely on fishing for their income such as women and elders. Ideas include trips to the nearby reef at Punta Frances aboard artisanal fishing boats, the establishment of bed and breakfasts and visits to a nearby loggerhead turtle nesting beach called El Guanal.
By engaging fishing towns at the community level, my colleagues and I in Mexico and Cuba are creating permanent social and economic alternatives to those with a short term payoff.

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