The Contribution of Indigenous People towards Sustainable Exploitation and Innovation in the Lake Victoria Fishery: A Case of Seme Sub-County, Kenya

Abstract

 Fishing by homegrown populations in Lake Victoria is a historical phenomenon located within the regions social, economic and political systems that exists today and in the past. However, it has been presented in most literature negatively, regarding the methods and management strategies, yet traditional communities are an important factor in the evolution of fishing industry both as a traditional and modern economy. Going by this apparent contradiction, there has been little research on indigenous communities' engagement in fishing in Lake Victoria basin with the overall objective of examining the socio-economic and technological transformation of the fishing industry. This paper aims at filling this information gap and provide a knowledge basis for intervention in the management of fishing among traditional communities along Lake Victoria, Kenya. Its broad objective is to analyze, using socio-economic and historical approaches, the socio-economic and technological transformation of the fishing industry in Seme Sub-County from the pre-colonial period. Articulation of modes of production theory, that describes the structure of change from pre-capitalist systems to capitalist systems of production and illustrating change as a series of interlocking developments is used to analyze the findings. Data were collected in a broad study implemented in sequential stages and employing a variety of methods. They included 196 interviews conducted in the 10 beaches of Seme Sub-County along Lake Victoria from a target population of 642 fishermen. Purposive sampling was used to identify 45 current fishermen, 9 old fishermen, 60 current fish traders, 5 old fish traders, 30 Beach Management Unit (BMU) leaders and 2 government officials from the department of fisheries and 45 cooperative members for interviews. Additional data came from unstructured and semi-structured interviews of the leaders of 4 co-operatives using participatory rural appraisal (PRA) techniques. Qualitative data analysis methods were applied, including content and thematic analysis. This paper argues that Seme fishers had their own indigenous techniques of fishing, modes of preservation and systems of management that ensured sustainable utilization of fisheries but both British colonialism and the independence government introduced new policies which encouraged the Seme fishers to partly break with their pre-colonial arrangements and adopt new ways of responding to modern demands in fishing market.