AN ANALYSIS OF CO-MANAGEMENT FISHERIES IN WEST SUMATRA PROVINCE, INDONESIA: A CASE STUDY OF IKAN LARANGAN INDAH SUSILOWATI Faculty of Economics, Diponegoro University ABSTRACT Several traditional Community-based Fisheries Resource Management (CBFRM) systems are still practised in Indonesia. Besides the traditional system, there are non-traditional ikan larangan system practised in West Padang, Sumatra in Indonesia. Ikan larangan is a kind of fisheries management system that applies closing seasons to fishing in a portion of river or canal for a certain period. The main objective of the study is to identify the condition for successful application of co- management fisheries or ikan larangan in West Sumatra. The institutional analysis as recommended by ICLARM (Pomeroy 1993) is employed as the research framework. There are three types of fisheries management: (1) traditional; (2) semi-traditional; and (3) modern. This classification is based on whether there is involvement of a religious leader (local term: pawang or buya) who employs magic to border the homerange of fish and/ or whether the fish reared in ikan larangan is marketable. For traditional ikan larangan, fish is considered a sacred creature and thus is not permitted to be killed. Local community believes that fish is endowed with magic and is not edible. They believe that if someone violates the rules (taking the fish) by chance or purposely, the person will receive a curse or other social or cultural punishment. While the modern ikan larangan is similar to the fish-farming system using a portion of river or irrigation canal, the system does not use modern equipment and technology. The semi-traditional system still employs a pawang but the fish can be sold. The total sample of 99 household respondents were drawn from the three sites of ikan larangan, i.e.,: (1) Lubuk Landur (traditional, n=19); (2) Kayu Tanam (semi-traditional, n=20); (3) Pasir Lawas (modern, n=60). The study emphasizes more on the modern system. This is an attempt to find out the possibility of implementing this system in other places in Indonesia as an alternative resource management and for food security purpose, as well as for enhancing the fisheries sector and regional country developments. The semi-traditional system was mostly found during the field survey in May 1999. The traditional system tends to decline in number since people nowadays become more practical for economic reasons. The preliminary analysis indicates that the modern ikan larangan will provide good prospects for implementation in Indonesia. However, collaboration between stakeholders, i.e., community and government in the study area is still very minimal. Moreover, the academic society and other stakeholders in the region where ikan larangan exists perhaps are not aware of the potency of the system as the new paradigm for fisheries resource management. Proceedings of the International Workshop on Fisheries Co-management 1 Introduction Background Indonesia is an archipelago which comprises more than 17 000 islands with various tribes under 27 provinces (BPS 1996). Each tribe has its unique customs. The major tribes (local term: suku) are Java, Minangkabau, Batak, Bugis, Ambon, Madura, etc. At present, these tribes are still practicing their customs (local term: adat) with different intensities. There are several traditional Community-based Fisheries Resource Management (CBFRM) systems that are still practised in Indonesia such as sasi (in Maluku), panglima laut (in Aceh), lubuk larangan (in North Sumatra). Some traditional practices, with their inherent believes or taboos also exist in Java like jum'at kliwonan, badhan, sedekah laut, terang bulanan, and orang tua (Susilowati 1996). Among those systems, sasi in Maluku is considered the most successful one, while the other systems seem to be weakening as reflected in reduced practice, like panglima laut and lubuk larangan. Besides these traditional systems, there are non-traditional CBFRMs operated by certain communities in Indonesia. There is a successful CBFRM system called ikan larangan that is practised by the Minangkabau tribe until now. Ikan means fish and larangan means forbidden to do something. Thereafter ikan larangan means a closed season for taking fish from a portion of a river, pond, or other fisheries resources in certain places in Minangkabau communities. The closed and opened seasons for ikan larangan is directed by a tokoh masyarakat (community leader). There are three types of ikan larangan, namely: traditional, semi-traditional, and modern. Modern ikan larangan was introduced in 1990s. Here the local community uses traditional ways to manage the system. Physically, the ikan larangan system is similar to lubuk larangan in North Sumatra (see Wahyono et al. 1992). Perhaps people are being inspired by the traditional system such as lubuk larangan or other opened and closed season systems such as sasi. Given available resource constraints and endowments, people have found survival strategies to meet basic family needs in the short run (Pomeroy 1991). Since there are many potential fisheries resource (i.e., rivers and/ or lakes) in West Sumatra, the community has adopted ikan larangan as one of the fish-farming systems as well as for recreational purposes recently. Many researchers have explored the sasi system. However, there is hardly any research conducted on community-based fisheries resource management for ikan larangan in West Sumatra. It is timely to investigate the success of the Minangkabau community in managing the ikan larangan resource as an indigenous co- management system especially in the fisheries sector. Objectives of the Study The overall objective of the study is to identify the conditions for successful application of co-management fisheries or the ikan larangan system in Minangkabau, West Sumatra. The specific objectives are: (1) To explore the characteristics of the ikan larangan system with respect to: a. Physical and biological attributes of fishery in the study area; b. Market attributes (demand and supply) of the resource’s products; c. Community attributes such as socioeconomic profiles of the resource users; d. Rule-in-use to manage the system; e. Institutional and organizational arrangements between government and local community which lead to the success of the ikan larangan system in the study area; f. External institutional arrangement, like organizations above village level, fisheries policy, and government management system; g. Pattern of interaction in sharing responsibility and authority to manage the fisheries such as collaboration among fisher community and/ or fisher households and/ or the authority. (2) To evaluate the performance of overall co-management system in the study area; (3) To measure the contribution of the ikan larangan system to the fisheries sector and to regional country developments. Proceedings of the International Workshop on Fisheries Co-management 2 Methodology The Study Area There are about seven big ikan larangan systems in West Sumatra Province, which are spread out in Padang Pariaman, Pasaman, and Agam districts. A list of ikan larangan sites is explored during field survey as shown in Table 1. The ikan larangan sites were selected in Lubuk Landur (Pasaman district) to represent the traditional system, while in Kayu Tanam and Pasir Lawas (Padang Pariaman district) were taken as samples for semi- traditional and modern systems, respectively. These three selected sites are considered the most successful in applying the co-management regime to manage the ikan larangan. Selection of the study areas was arrived at after field surveys and discussions with the competent people. Data and Sampling There are two types of data collected for this study, i.e., primary and secondary data. The primary data was taken from a household survey, informal discussions with key persons, and focus group discussions with the competent persons. Ninety-nine household samples were drawn from the three selected sites using purposive random sampling (see Table 1). The face-to-face interviews was applied to survey the household respondents. Interviews with respondents were carried out by the students of the Fisheries Faculty of Bung Hatta University, Padang, West Sumatra. Training was given to all enumerators before they undertook the survey. The researchers supervised the survey. A standardized questionnaire was used to collect data from the respondents. The secondary data were collected from the concerned institutions (Fisheries Office, Central Bureau of Statistics of West Sumatra Province, and the Provincial Local Government Offices) and various related publications. Table 1. A list of ikan larangan sites in West Sumatra No. Sites Type Location No. of Households Sampled 1 Salibutan Semi-traditional Desa Silabutan Kec. Lubuk Aling Kab. Padang Pariaman 2 Pasir Lawas Modern Desa Pasir Lawas Selected as the Kec. Lubuk Simatung study area (n=60) Kab. Padang Pariaman 3 Titian Panjang Semi-traditional Desa Palambaran Selected as the (Kayu Tanam) Kec. 2x16 Lingkung study area (n=20) Kab. Padang Pariaman 4 Sungai Jernih Traditional Desa Sungai Jernih Kec. Baso Kab. Agam 5 Sungai Jaring Semi-traditional Desa Pauh Kembar Desa Padang Kandang Kec. Nansa Baris Kab. Padang Pariaman 6 Sungai Silambu Traditional Desa Sepakat Langgam Kec. Kenali Kab. Pasaman 7 Lubuk Landur Traditional Desa Lubuk Landur Selected as the Kec. Pasaman study area (n=19) Kab. Pasaman Proceedings of the International Workshop on Fisheries Co-management 3 8* IPBS