FishLinks - Scrutinizing the impact of tourism-driven fish consumption on reef fish communities

About the project

Coral reefs are vital to global biodiversity and provide essential resources for millions of people, yet they face significant threats from overfishing, climate change and pollution. Although tourism can provide livelihoods and boost local economies, it may also contribute to increased inequities and undermine both livelihood and environmental sustainability.

The island of Zanzibar in Tanzania welcomes about half a million foreign visitors per year, which brings revenues to the island’s economy, but this large increase in population also puts pressure on the ecosystems. Increased market demand and/or the preferences for certain species or specific sizes of species may lead to unsustainable fishing pressure and overexploitation. This might in turn limit access to certain species, and exclude low-income consumers from buying seafood, which is an important protein source in many coastal areas in Tanzania. The project FishLinks investigates if the tourism in Tanzania is contributing to unsustainably high fishing pressure, and if so, in what ways.

This is what we want to achieve

Our overarching objective is to examine the potential impact of tourism-driven fish consumption on reef fish populations along the Tanzanian coast. By doing so, we aim to identify fish species that are unsustainably fished and should be avoided in local hotels and restaurants and provide information on fish species that could be a better alternative. We also aim to understand how fishing for tourism may affect the local availability and consumption of seafood.

By informing stakeholders from both tourist management institutions and the hospitality industry as well as tourists, we want to leverage the knowledge base concerning seafood consumption and the impact this may have on the marine environment and thus contribute to people making more informed choices.

Conceptual illustration of the FishLinks project design.

This is what we are doing

The FishLinks project combines both social data collected by interview studies with ecological data collected by underwater surveys to answer our research questions in this interdisciplinary project. To achieve information about the status of reef fish communities in Tanzania and potential signs of overexploitation, ecological data is mainly collected by conducting standardized underwater visual census (UVC) in three locations with varying tourism; Zanzibar (high) Mafia Island (intermediate) and Mtwara (low) using SCUBA.

To map and trace the demands of different stakeholder groups, qualitative and quantitative data is collected through semi-structured interviews. Interviews are conducted with three distinct stakeholder groups: local fishers, fish traders and executives from both local and touristic restaurants and hotels. The surveys also include catch data from landing sites, markets and import/export data from the fishery authorities. Combined with the ecological data that we collect below the surface, we aim to describe the potential ecological effects from increased demands for seafood, and how tourism fits into this complex setting.

Seafood at display in a restaurant in Nungwi, Unguja Island which targets tourists. Photo: Charlotte Berkström.