What?
Webinar : RE-IMAGINING FISHER PEOPLES’ IDENTITIES: Political Challenges and Path Forward. Organized by the World Forum of Fisher Peoples (WFFP) and Coastal Action Network (CAN).
Opening Remarks: Herman Kumara, General Secretary, WFFP
Speakers:
- Naseegh Jaffar, Former GS of WFFP, South Africa
- M Pushparayan Ideologue of the Fisher movements, India
- Ms. Shalmali Guttal Working Group member on UNDROP
- Piya Thetyaem, Secretary General of The Federation of Thailand Fisherfolks Association
- Nus Ukru , Baileo Maluku, Indonesia
- Mads Barbesgaard Transnational Institute (TNI)
Response To Sharing:
Carsten Pedersen, TNI Jones T Spartegus, PAR
Way Forward & Concluding Remarks
Jesu Rethinam, Coordinator, WFFP Asia Pacific Continental Fora & CC Member, WFFP
When?
18 OCTOBER 2024
India: 0930 -1230 / Bangladesh: 1000-1300/ Thailand: 1100-1400
Where?
ZOOM Link: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/81253440310
Small Scale Fisheries Versus Fisher peoples
Since the advent and growth of human civilisations, river banks and coastal landscapes were established and sustained by coastal communities and inland/coastal fisher peoples. In Asia, there are various terminologies to describe fisher peoples; fisher folks, traditional fishers, fishing tribes, sea tribes, artisanal fishers, for instance Bajau (fishers), also called the sea gypsies or sea nomads in Indonesia.
Therefore, fisher peoples are different ethnic cultural groups solely dependent on fisheries, waters and land for whom fishing is their identity. This also includes riverine based fisher communities and coastal communities depend on fisheries and its allied activities historically. Historically, fisher peoples consider Ocean and Coast Ecology (OCE) as their territories and place of home lands. OCE comprises of rivers, land (coast), oceans (sea), brackish waterbodies (connected to the sea) and forests (mangroves, swamps). Traditionally fisher peoples collectively govern, conserve and assert the OCE as their customary commons, also called as Fisher Commons.
Today, in a globalised and industrial economy, the Fisher Commons are appropriated in various ways to enable profit and enable economic growth. Nation states are enacting the so called ‘Blue Deal’; which is an ocean-based trade arrangement, to ease blue businesses with oceans as the new frontiers of growth and corporate accumulation. This process of grabbing the fisher commons for profiteering interests of the State and/ or private entities is termed as ‘Ocean Grab’. The State’s and corporations grab and abuse of the fisher commons in name of development had systematically legitimatised the alienation of the fisherfolk from their vast ecologies and disintegrates their egalitarian way of ‘living, working and governing together with commons’.
On the otherside, fisheries play a vital role in both in terms of its contribution to the economy, as well as in the diet of many cultures. Fish remains an affordable food-animal source of protein and primary source of nutrition for more than a billion people in the world, particularly for developing countries. More than 500 million people depend directly on fisheries for their livelihoods and millions are employed in fisheries value chains in roles such as processing or marketing. Among the workforce, nearly three-fourths are women.
In this webinar, speakers and respondents will reflect on these questions:
(Fisher Peoples Identity; Role of class, caste, gender and the way of life of traditional communities)
- Who are the fishers? A dialogue on identity, caste, class, gender and other factors in traditional fisher peoples’ way of life
- What is our cultural and socio-political identity? (For instance, where do we understand ourselves in the following framework of historical, traditional, indigenous, customary, artisanal, capture, small-scale, etc?)
- How do we relate to the questions around the Custodianship of land and water territories?
- Are we a civilisation by ourselves (this question must relate to coastal and inland fishers), as oceanic or riverine? If so why is it that our civilisation does not find mention in the historical narratives of mainlanders?
- How fisher peoples share identity with other food producers and other people living in rural areas?
For the second webinar of the series: The Shift from Capture to Culture Fisheries & Challenges in Advancing Food Sovereignty held on 27th September, 2024
For the recording of the first webinar (Part 1&2) *Customary Governance, Tenure and Traditional Rights of Fisher Peoples
Part – 1: 9th September 2024 : country case presentations from Bangladesh, India, Thailand, Indonesia, Malaysia, Sri Lanka
Part – 2: 10th September.2024 : Response to country presentations and thematic presentations
Organised by Asia Pacific Continental Fora of WFFP along with Coastal Action Network and other fisher organisations and support groups