A Longitudinal Governance Analysis of a Locally Managed Marine Area: Ankobohobo Wetland Small-Scale Mud Crab Fishery, Madagascar

Small-scale fisheries are a cornerstone of coastal livelihoods throughout Madagascar, providing income, nutrition, and a way of life to over half a million people. Due to limited state capacity, community-based management of marine resources has proliferated, with locally-managed marine areas (LMMAs) becoming a major avenue for coastal resource governance in Madagascar. Though case studies of LMMAs exist, little research has tracked their effectiveness over time. In 2016, the Marine Protected Areas Governance (MPAG) framework was used to critically assess the governance of the Ankobohobo wetland’s mud crab fishery: the first analysis of a fishery produced using the framework. This study revisits Ankobohobo using the same methodology three years later, representing the first longitudinal application of the framework. Overall, participants throughout the fishery revealed a lack of progress towards management goals and emphasized the vulnerability of the governance model to external drivers of change. Despite substantial efforts from fishers and fishing associations to secure sustainable crab fishing, progress is hindered by an absence of support from the state or NGOs. Persistent challenges include intensified mangrove logging, declining crab stocks, increased fishing effort, and entrenched poverty. These are driven by factors beyond the communities’ control: global markets, population growth, migration, and a lack of viable, income-generating activities. These findings emphasise that a purely bottom-up, community-led approach cannot address external drivers. Effective governance requires a diversity of actors and incentives combining bottom-up and top-down approaches. The absence of this in Ankobohobo explains the lack of progress in the three years between these assessments.