Fishery governance, practices and learning at international, national and community level on the Namibian and Zambian side of the Kwando River

The Kwando River - shared by Angola, Botswana, Namibia and Zambia and flows through the world’s largest protected area, the Kavango Zambezi Transfrontier Conservation Area (KAZA TFCA) - is not excluded from this interest due to the many challenges it faces. Fishery Governance for one, faces challenges around rules, regulations, policies and fishing practices among riparian countries at international, national and community level.

Figure 1: Map showing the the Kwando River. Source: (Pallett & Mendelsohn, 2021).

My PhD research centres on three challenges being unharmonised vision at transboundary level, uncoordinated enforcement of national policies, and differences in governing systems. Another challenge, is the use of illegal and unsustainable fishing practices at community level, contributing to degradation of the ecological system and decline in fish stock. These three challenges are investigated on the Namibian and Zambian side of the Kwando River. Here, I aim to understand how fishery governance, practices and learning is organised at transboundary, national and community level on the Namibian and Zambian side of the Kwando. This main research question is unpacked as follows in the sub-questions:

(1) how do different actors and activities in Namibia, Zambia and transboundary authorities influence fishery policies of the Kwando River?

(2) how do national authorities in Namibia and Zambia develop, implement and enforce fishery practice? (3) what are the fishery practices of fishing communities along the Kwando River in Namibia and Zambia and how do they affect fish ecosystems and catches?

(4) how are the different stakeholders currently interacting and learning from each other, and how could this process be fostered?

Figure: An illustration of research sub-questions

In order to unpack the different concepts and paradigm of thinking imposed on these questions and to understand the governance failure through the multi-level and transboundary dynamics, I use Practice Architectures Theory and its arrangements, Social learning and Governance. Practice Architectures aim to understand complex socio-ecological issues by analysing its arrangements of cultural-discursive (words used to describe things to make meaning) , material-economic (resources behind enactment of the practice) and social-political (issues around relational dynamics including power relations within a practice). By using these arrangements in addressing the stated governance failures it reveals narratives, understanding, values and priorities reflected in national and transboundary policies within the national level and at transboundary level of governance that hinder cooperation as well as varying cultural norms, values and historical backgrounds among community fisher folk. Further, other revelation rests on power dynamics in the sense of ideologies that have contributed to unsustainable fishing practices as well as whether such ideologies are perpetuated by dominant perspectives while others are marginalized. Under the arrangement of material-economic the study considers governance failures by showing how unequal access of resources across the multi-level dynamics impact governance efforts. Whereas, the arrangement of socio-political shed light on governance failure in the sense of power struggles and imbalances where analysing power dynamics reveals different actors, those who influence and those who are marginalized and ideologies perpetuating unsustainable fishing practices. By considering governance in practice in this way, I hope to use learning through interactions in the multi-level to possibly arrive at new thinking around these governance failures. Here I use social learning which is seen as a way of addressing wicked problems associated to natural resources management.

The methodology encompasses collective methods that when composed together form the river co-learning arena. These methods include analysis of documents and policies; interviews with key actors at transboundary, national and local level; and multi-stakeholder workshops which use innovative tools to evoke discussion.

PROMOTOR(S):
Prof Arjen Wals Education and Learning Sciences
Prof Heila Lotz-Sisitka, SARChI Chair: Global Change and Social Learning Systems, Environmental Learning Research Centre, Department of Education Rhodes University (External Promotor)

CO-PROMOTOR(S):
Dr Jeroen Vos, Water Resources Management
Dr Lieke Melsen Hydrology and Quantitative Water Management