Fish Vool) to Tuna and Sardine Sectors in the Philippines
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Fisheries Research 161 (2015) 174–181 Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Fisheries Research j ournal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/fishres Development and application of the fisheries vulnerability assessment tool (Fish Vool) to tuna and sardine sectors in the Philippines a a,b a Melchor R. Jacinto , Al Jayson G. Songcuan , Graceous Von Yip , a,∗ Mudjekeewis D. Santos a National Fisheries Research and Development Institute, 101 Mother Ignacia St., Quezon City, Philippines b Marine Science Institute, University of the Philippines Diliman, 1101 Quezon City, Philippines a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t Article history: Climate change studies in the Philippines are emerging fast, focusing on different fields of sciences. How- Received 20 January 2014 ever, studies that address the fisheries sector remain insufficient. Here, we described a sector-based Received in revised form 4 July 2014 fisheries vulnerability assessment tool (Fish Vool) to evaluate the vulnerability of primary fishery com- Accepted 5 July 2014 modities. Tool demonstration and validation were conducted in General Santos and Zamboanga City, which are the primary producers of tuna and sardine, respectively. Fish Vool revealed an overall medium Keywords: vulnerability (low exposure, medium sensitivity, and low adaptive capacity) for both sectors. The vulner- Climate change ability assessment of the tuna and sardine sectors emphasizes the potential of Fish Vool to assess climate Vulnerability assessment tool Fisheries change vulnerability for primary commodities and other fishery sectors. © 2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. Food security 1. Introduction Accordingly, a National Framework Strategy on Climate Change was formed to aid in adaptive capacity building of communities and Climate change, also referred to as global warming, is the optimization of mitigation opportunities toward sustainable devel- increase in global atmospheric temperature and high variability in opment. The Philippine climate change policy provides guidelines frequency and intensity of extreme weather disturbances, which for the development of adaptation strategies, which can be accom- poses threat to society, biodiversity, economy, and food secu- plished by conducting vulnerability assessments (VAs), among rity (Adger et al., 2005; IPCC, 2001). Philippine development and others (e.g., Allison et al., 2009; Cochrane et al., 2009; Mamauag progress are critically related to the adaptive capacity toward the et al., 2013; Santos et al., 2011). VAs, especially for fisheries and emerging effects of climate change. The fisheries sector contributes aquaculture, provide a better way to understand the interactions to the country’s economy by generating approximately 2.2% (170.3 among the natural system, pressures, and threats, which serves as billion pesos) of gross domestic product and 452 million dollars of a basis for the development of climate change adaptation (CCA) export earnings (Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources (BFAR), options (Mamauag et al., 2013). 2010), as well as providing sources of livelihood to rural areas and Several climate change and VA studies (Jose and Cruz, 1999; coastal communities. However, this sector may be highly vulner- Badjeck et al., 2010; Sajise et al., 2012; Mamauag et al., 2013) have able to the impacts of climate change (Burke et al., 2012; Hughes been conducted in the Philippines, which also included the devel- et al., 2012). Harmeling (2011) ranked the Philippines as the sev- opment of a VA tool. However, most of these vulnerability tools enth most vulnerable country to climate change on the basis of were designed to evaluate the vulnerability of specific subjects long-term trends of exposure and extreme weather events from only. Mamauag et al. (2013) designed a framework for the VA of 1990 to 2009. Impacts contributing to the vulnerability of fisheries coastal fisheries ecosystems (Tool for Understanding Resilience of include direct and indirect effects of physical and chemical factors, Fisheries, VA-TURF). VA-TURF was used to assess the vulnerability such as temperature, winds, vertical mixing, salinity, oxygen, and of the coastal fisheries ecosystems in the tropics to climate change. pH (Brander, 2010). This tool was demonstrated in all coastal barangays of two island municipalities located along the Verde Island Passage, which has the world’s highest marine shore fish biodiversity. However, VA- TURF is limited to fisheries associated with nearshore habitats, uses ∗ the coastal or fishing village (barangay) as the spatial unit, and lacks Corresponding author. Tel.: +632 3725063. E-mail address: [email protected] (M.D. Santos). commercial and sectoral levels of assessment. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.fishres.2014.07.007 0165-7836/© 2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. M.R. Jacinto et al. / Fisheries Research 161 (2015) 174–181 175 Table 1 Fisheries vulnerability assessment matrix (scoring guide). Components Score 1 or 2 3 or 4 5 Sensitivity Compare catch 20 years ago Increasing catch rate over the Normal catch rate: Mix of Decreasing catch rate; Small, (Catch rate = number of kgs. years; Most catches are large, small and large fishes immature fishes are abundant added/deducted from the catch mature fishes 20 yrs ago compared today) ≥ ± ≤ Average length at first sexual 5 cm;Greater than 2 cm but 2 cm; Greater than 2 cm but 5 cm maturity (for validation) less than 5 cm less than 5 cm Dependence on resource Household income from 41–60%; 61–30% Household income from resource-dependent is less resource-dependent is greater than 20%; 21–40% than 80% Household age structure 26–40; 41–55 15–25; 56–65 above 65 years old (15–70 y/o) Health conditions No special health needs Symptomatic diseases With special health needs Exposure Fishing ground (annually) Rare occurrence of typhoons, Intermediate incidence of Frequented by typhoons, storms, weather disturbances typhoons, storms, weather storms, weather disturbances (0–1); 2 disturbances (3); 4 (5 above) Household (annually) (0–1); 2 3; 4 More than 5 weather disturbances Frequency of storms/typhoons, No climate events 3–4; 5–6 More than 6 climate events records of landslides and/or experienced; 1–2 experienced flash floods (annually) Adaptive Capacity What is the annual income More than 80% of annual 40–59%; 20–39% Less than 20% came from from fishing? income is generated from fishing fishing: 60–79% Awareness No to little idea about the topic Moderately knows the topic Knows the topic very well Access to information No sources of information; 1–2 3–4; 5–6 More than 6 sources of information Adaptive strategy No to insignificant Less but significant More and significant precautionary measures precautionary measures precautionary measures Literacy Out of school youth or High school College or vocational elementary student/graduate graduate/student/skilled student/graduate Gear modification/replacement No modification/No With some modification/With With full modification, for the past 10 years knowledge/No resources knowledge/With limited knowledge, and re-sources (budget) resources/Unsuccessful Successful Climate change No climate change 2–3 climate change More than 4 climate change support/organization support/organization support/organization support/organization Table 2 This study developed a tool that will complement VA-TURF Potential impact scoring. by providing effective data collection for assessing the poten- tial impacts of climate change to commercial fishery sectors or Potential Sensitivity impact commodities. The tool enables the identification of fisheries com- modities and areas that are highly vulnerable to climate change, L M H which is important for the formulation of measures that will Exposure L L L M address the impacts of climate change on fisheries and ensure M L M H sustainable livelihood and food security (Food and Agriculture H M H H Organization (FAO), 2008). Table 3 2. Methodology Overall vulnerability index scoring. Vulnerability Adaptive capacity 2.1. Development of Fish Vool and vulnerability map L M H The fisheries vulnerability assessment tool (Fish Vool) was Potential L M L L developed following the key goal of VA (e.g., Allison et al., 2009; impact M H M L IPCC, 2001; Mamauag et al., 2013) to determine the vulner- H H H M abilities of fishery commodities or sectors of local municipal or commercial landing sites. The tool was refined using input and validation from fisheries and VA specialists of the University of the Philippines—Marine Science Institute, National Agricultural and (2013) (Tables 2 and 3). An open source geographic information Fishery Council, and Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources system software (Quantum GIS v1.8 Lisboa) was used to pro- (BFAR) regional representatives to eliminate unnecessary parame- duce vulnerability maps of the target commodities. Scores of 1 ters and incorporate relevant components. to 2 correspond to low vulnerability, and scores of 3 to 4 corre- Key informants from General Santos and Zamboanga City were spond to medium vulnerability; a score of 5 corresponds to high interviewed and assessed in November 2012 and August 2013, vulnerability (Table 4). The numerical values of each component respectively, using a vulnerability matrix (Table 1). Data were ana- were summed and translated using a rank system, in which point lyzed using a simple semi-quantitative approach (Johnson and class intervals correspond to low, medium, and high vulnerability Welch, 2009; Mamauag et al., 2013), and scores calculated using (Mamauag et al., 2013) (Table 5). the cross-tabulation (Punnett square) method by Mamauag et al. 176 M.R. Jacinto et al. / Fisheries Research 161 (2015) 174–181 Fig. 1. Fish Vool study sites. Table 4 fishing wharfs in barangay Cawit, Zamboanga City were selected as Vulnerability category. study sites (Fig. 1) on the basis of data availability and productivity Vulnerability category Score of tuna and sardine resource in the area, respectively. Fish produc- tion in General Santos mainly consists of large pelagic fishes such Low 1–2 Medium 3–4 as yellowfin tuna and other scombrids, whereas Zamboanga City High 5 is well known for the production of small epipelagic fishes (i.e., sardines, round scads, and mackerels).