Tim M. Daw|Joshua E. Cinner|Tim R. McClanahan|Katrina Brown|Selina M. Stead|Nicholas A. J. Graham|Joseph Maina
To Fish or Not to Fish: Factors at Multiple Scales Affecting Artisanal Fishers' Readiness to Exit a Declining Fishery
Stockholm Resilience Centre|Stockholm University|University of East Anglia|ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies|James Cook University|Wildlife Conservation Society|University of East Anglia|Newcastle University|ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies|James Cook University|Wildlife Conservation Society|Macquarie University
globally fisheries challenged combined impacts overfishing degradation ecosystems impacts climate change fisheries livelihoods pressured conservation policy imperatives fishers adaptive responses pressures exiting fishery pursue alternative livelihoods determine vulnerability well potential reducing fishing effort sustaining fisheries willingness ability make particular adaptations response change exiting declining fishery influenced economic cultural institutional factors operating scales individual fishers national economies previous studies exit fisheries single sites offer limited insight relative importance individual largerscale social economic factors asked 599 fishers would respond hypothetical scenarios catch declines 28 sites five western indian ocean countries investigated socioeconomic variables individual household sitescale affected whether would exit fisheries sitelevel factors greatest influence readiness exit relationships contrary common predictions specifically higher levels infrastructure development economic vitality expected promote exit fisheries associated less readiness exit may due site level histories exit fisheries greater specialisation fishing households higher rewards fishing economically developed sites due technology market access catch value government subsidies individual household scale fishers households livelihood activities fishers lower catch value willing exit results demonstrate empirically adaptive responses change influenced factors multiple scales highlight importance understanding natural resourcebased livelihoods context wider economy society