The Marginalization of the World’s Small-Scale Fishers and What to Do About It

Sustainable development aspires to “leave no one behind.” But over 500 million people - among the most affected by negative changes to our planet during the anthropocene have been ignored and have been practically invisible to policy-makers for decades, being (e.g., absent in censuses and trade, production and employment official statistics, among others). These millions of people can be categorized as small-scale fishers and their dependents. All of them rely on aquatic environments to sustain some or most of their livelihoods. Being often left out of food, labour, gender, environmental or other types of policies, reinforces a vicious cycle of marginalization which compromises the ability of this sector to make contributions to sustainable development. How can this invisibility be overcome? How can we redress these environmental justice issues? What are the normative pathways to do so? This session explores two interlinked approaches to elicit reflection on them: (1) the Voluntary Guidelines for Ensuring Sustainable Small-Scale Fisheries in the Context of Food Security and Poverty Eradication as a global soft law strongly advocated for by small-scale fisheries organizations themselves, and (2) the FAO, Duke University, WorldFish and Stanford University Illuminating Hidden Harvests initiative, dedicated to providing new multidimensional evidence and approaches to inform small-scale fisheries development, management and governance, involving about 800 contributors around the world.

Speakers: Xavier Basurto and Nicole Franz, Stanford University

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Room: Hartley Conference Center