Abstract: The illegal exploitation of wild abalone in South Africa has been escalating since 1994, despite increased enforcement, leading to collapse in some sections of its range. South Africa banned all wild abalone fishing in 2008 but controversially reopened it in 2010. This paper formulates a poacher’s model, taking into account the realities of the abalone terrain in South Africa—the prevalence of bribery, corruption, use of recreational drugs, and the high value of abalone—to explore why poaching has not subsided. The paper suggests two additional measures that might help ameliorate the situation: eliminating the demand side through enforcement targeted on organized crime, and ceding the resource to the local coastal communities. However, local communities need to be empowered to deal with organised crime groups. Complementary measures to bring back community patriotism will also be needed given the tattered social fabric of the local coastal communities.

Abstract: Namibian hake is the most important fish resource in Namibia. This monograph is a compilation of all the hake data, historic and recent, that has been used to inform stock assessment and management since the late 1970s. It presents the statistical catch-at-age analysis used to evaluate the state of the Namibian hake resource under different assumptions. This analysis treats the two hakes, Merluccius paradoxus and M. capensis, as a single stock. The data and modeling show that the stock has not as yet recovered to its maximum sustainable yield level, despite foreign fishing effort having been removed in 1990. Best estimates suggest the current stock to be roughly 20% of pre-exploitation levels; however this figure is sensitive to model assumptions. Signs indicate that the stock is slowly recovering from its all-time low in 2002-2004. Because the two hake species are pooled for assessment, the resource is currently managed on a relatively simple adaptive basis; 80% of the estimated replacement yield is reserved for fishing, the remainder being left for rebuilding.

Abstract: Although Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) provide an increasingly popular policy tool for protecting marine stocks and biodiversity, they pose high costs for small-scale fisherfolk who have few alternative livelihood options in poor countries. MPAs often address this burden on local households by providing some benefits to compensate locals and/or induce compliance with restrictions. We argue that MPAs in poor countries can only contribute to sustainability if management induces changes in resource-dependent households‘ incentives to fish. With Tanzania‘s Mnazi Bay Ruvuma Estuary Marine Park (MBREMP) and its internal villages as an example, we use an economic decision modeling framework as a lens to examine incentives, reaction to incentives, and implications for sustainable MPA management created by park managers‘ use of enforcement ("sticks") and livelihood projects ("carrots"). We emphasize practical implementation issues faced by MBREMP managers and implications for fostering marine ecosystem sustainability in a poor country setting.