Roger Mollot and Pauline Gerrard - helping people in Laos to keep their fisheries sustainable

Naomi and I were overjoyed to have our daughter Pauline, her husband Roger and their daughter Grace with us in Canada for a month this summer. For a number of years now, they have been living in Laos and working with people there to help people in communities along the tributaries of the Mekong River find effective ways to keep their fisheries sustainable. Both Pauline and Roger are now fluent in the Loatian language and their role is to help people in the communities undertake effective stewardship of their own fisheries.

Fish forms an important part of the diet for people in Laos. It is said that about 65% of the protein eaten by people in Laos comes from fish. Most of the fish comes from the Mekong River and its tributaries. The Mekong is a huge tropical river, and their are many tributaries in Laos.

Their emphasis is helping people in communities to protect critical fish habitat - specifically the deep holes in the rivers where fish congregate during the dry season, and the wetlands, particularly those in the floodplains, where fish spawn and young fish grow.

The large flows in the rivers in the wet season create deep pools in the rivers - some up to 100 or more meters deep. When the dry season comes, these pools are reserves where the fish concentrate. Preventing overfishing in such pools is critical to ensuring good fish stocks and a sustainable fishery. In some communities, there is an inherited cultural understanding which has been very important in enabling the village to close the fishery along critical stretches of the nearby river - in one example a stretch of 2.5 kilometers of river. The evidence to date is showing this is having a dramatic effect to improve the fishery. This approach is consistent with emerging practices elsewhere which show that closing certain critical habitats to fishing can have a big positive impact (see also http://www.manitobaliberals.ca/2006/08/canadian-example-of-year-round-closing.html - for a Canadian example).

Another part of their activities is understanding critical habitat for spawning and for the young fish. Flooded wetlands appear to have a very important role. For example, the flooded wetlands have abundant nutrients to nurture young fish. The flooded vegetation (grasses, shrubs etc) also provides really good habitat for the young fish to be protected from larger predatory fish and so increases the survival of young fish.

The work that Roger and Pauline are doing in Laos has important implications for the protection of fisheries elsewhere in the world including in Canada. We know, for example, that there are lakes in Manitoba where the fisheries are not doing as well as they should be. Lake Winnipegosis is an example of a lake where the fishery is still not back to what it was before 1960.

Congratulations to Roger and Pauline on your efforts.

The top photo shows Roger and Pauline. The bottom photo shows Grace. For more information see: http://www.livingplanet.org/about_wwf/what_we_do/freshwater/news/successes/index.cfm?uNewsID=14219