1. Alternative technology development in fisheries and Coops V.Vivekanandan Former Chief Executive South Indian Federation of Fishermen Societies

2. What this story is about The quest for alternative boat building technologies on the south west coast of India The introduction and spread of marine plywood boats all along the SW coast The role of fishworker coops in the new technology development Long term impacts The current challenge of sustainable fisheries and future of small scale fisheries

3. Replacing the kattumaram 1980: Fr.Gillet, KSSS & CAT Perceived shortage of Albizia logs Idea to develop Kattumaram made of other materials—Fibre glass or ferrocement Partnership with Edwin Gifford and ITDG Marine plywood boat built with “stitch and glue” methodology First prototype of a Kottar Kat, a kattumaram substitute meant for sailing and rowing introduced in 1981

6. Context of new tech introduction Blue revolution starting from mid 1960s Introduction of mechanised trawlers leading to creation of dualism in fisheries: “new modern” sector and “traditional/artisanal” sector Competition for resources between two sectors Decline of share of traditional fishermen and depletion of near shore fisheries Traditional fishermen desperate to go deeper to tap new fish resources just to survive Arrival of imported Outboard Motors; innovate fishermen put OBM on kattumaram

7. Kottarkat, a runaway success Fishermen latched on to the Kottarkat as most suitable beach landing and surf crossing boat for use with OBMs Increased range of operations and caught more fish However, Kottarkat not designed for use with motors and started cracking up Changes in design to suit motorisation and call back of sold boats to strengthen them The new marine plywood boat become a runaway success—not as kattumaram substitute but as an intermediate technology between traditional boats and mechanised trawlers It was later found that even the shortage of Albizia was not really true: new social forestry initiative in Kerala had actually led to increase in Albizia availability!

9. SIFFS Around 1980 another initiative in neighbouring Trivandrum district of Kerala was taking off “Marianad” model of fishermen coop to market fish and provide credit emerged in 1970 and started slowly spreading in Trivandrum and Kanyakumari districts through Church organisations and associated NGOs Trivandrum fish marketing coops got together in 1980 to form the South Indian Federation of Fishermen Societies or SIFFS to take fish marketing to higher level

10. SIFFS takes over responsibility of new technology Fr.Gillet and his associates, seeing that the new boats were mainly going to Kerala decided that SIFFS as a fishermen’s coop federation is most appropriate institution to take up further development of the new technology and to commercialise it Reluctantly, SIFFS took up the challenge and started a boat building unit in 1983 As traditional fishermen started rapidly modernising and adopting OBMs across the south west coast of India, the plywood boat demand increased Over time SIFFS developed many new designs to suit users of other traditional craft like vallams (canoes) Network of production and repair centres in Kerala, TN and Southern Karnataka

13. Current status Private sector—entirely small and cottage sector scale—has adopted technology and now manufactures much more boats than SIFFS Over a 100,000 boats sold all over the SW coast using marine ply boat technology; 25,000 boats currently in operation from Kanyakumari to Ratnagiri; SIFFS share around 25%

14. Short and medium term impacts Small scale fisheries (SSF), facing extinction due to competition with trawlers, survived, even started thriving Increase in productivity of ssf with significant increases in capital costs and operating costs Greater dependency on fossil fuels and state subsidies for kerosene the fuel for OBMs. Scaling up took place incrementally allowing for capital accumulation in ssf without losing control to outside investors Owner-worker differentiation, which was weak earlier, became more pronounced, but class formation in the classical sense was weak due to hurdles for accumulation (traditional sharing system) with traditional village communities continuing to have control of fishing boats By 2000, nearly 90% of small fishing boats are motorised—very little of sailing and rowing vessels left in the fishery

15. Long term impacts New technology introduced when overall fisheries resource exploitation was high in coastal waters but low in offshore and deep sea areas of India’s EEZ Now both mechanised motors and motorised vessels fish all over the Indian seas with over 90% of the potential yield being already exploited While trawling remains a major problem for fisheries management, small scale sector is also now guilty of overfishing and resource degradation SSF has adopted scaled down versions of mechanised fishing gear—mini-trawl, ring seine, etc.

18. Coop control over technology-- advantages The role played by SIFFS in boat building has been beneficial: – Continuing R&D to provide boats to suit different areas and needs – Strong fishermen oversight of R&D and boat building has ensured boat prices and repair charges are reasonable – In addition to price leadership, SIFFS ensures quality benchmarks and indirectly regulates private boat yards – Establishing control over imported OBMs and spares through direct imports—all-India distributor of OBMs

19. Coops--Limitations While coops have been useful in market exploitation of fishermen—fish marketing, credit and inputs—they have proved ineffective in fisheries resource management The trade unions that came up with SIFFS, well beyond the area of SIFFS, to fight for small fishermen rights, have also been found ineffective in resource management

20. New set of institutions for resource management History of fisheries management by traditional and customary institutions across the coast before coming of blue revolution These institutions continue to operate with diminished power as mechanised boats operate outside their control and motorisation has resulted in new divisions within SSF State laws to manage fisheries have emerged with some regulations implemented by the state State intervention in resource management only marginally successful A new regime for fisheries management is called for The “Co-management” idea Current experiments