The Hindu : Tamil Nadu / Tiruchi News : Call for clear understanding of coastal ecosystem

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Monday, Jan 31, 2005

Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu - Tiruchi

Call for clear understanding of coastal ecosystem

By Our Special Correspondent

TIRUCHI, JAN.30. Research cutting across disciplinary boundaries helps to understand the complexity associated with nature-society relationships, said Maarten Bavinck, Assistant Professor of Human Geography at the University of Amsterdam, the Netherlands.

Dr. Bavinck was delivering a special lecture on `Challenging coast: social science perspectives on coastal dynamics,' organised by the Centre for Youth Development and Studies, Centre for Women's Studies, and the National Social Service unit of Bharathidasan University here on Friday.

He said a clear understanding of the dynamics of the coastal ecosystem is a prerequisite for designing and implementing `integrated coastal resource management' policies, which promote sustainability of the coastal environment.

Several socio-economic factors such as demographic developments, infrastructure developments, mineral exploitation, aqua-cultural developments, aqua-tourism and fisheries put pressure on the long-term sustainability of the marine environment.

Over-fishing, a global trend, is one of the results of these pressures. The catch per unit of effort (CPUE), a tool that gauges the quality of the fish resource base, is declining over a period of time, and Tamil Nadu is not an exception.

Currently working on a research project supported by the Indo-Dutch Programme on Alternatives in Development, which explores the institutional dynamics of marine resources management in South Asia, the Dutch academic questioned the hypothesis of Homer-Dixon that environmental scarcity leads to social violence, a dominant paradigm among international policy-making bodies and academia.

The results of the past two decades of his research on marine fisheries management in South Asia invalidate the Homer-Dixon hypothesis. He said that there was `no direct connection between the increasing scarcity of fish resources and social violence.' Simplistic assumptions of human behaviour will not help understand the problems at hand.

In fact, social conflicts among fisherfolk and between fisherfolk and state institutions are found in the South Asian coastline. These phenomena need to be understood in a broader context of the changing fisheries economy such as fish marketing networks and price mechanism, character of fisheries (mechanised and non-mechanised sub-sectors) and the prevalence of institutions to resolve conflicts.

A thorough understanding of the dynamics of the coastal ecosystem is possible by incorporating various disciplines. This requires tolerance and mutual understanding among academics, solid fieldwork and inclusion of multi-stakeholders, he said.

Postgraduates, and M.Phil. and Ph.D. students from various disciplines, and teaching staff from different departments participated.

S. Lakshmi, Head (in-charge), Department of Economics, and N. Manimekalai, Director (in-charge), Centre for Women's Studies, spoke.

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