Keywords

1 Introduction

Global marine fisheries have grown over the past century, reaching a peak of 90–130 million metric tons per year in the mid-1990s, before the steady decline in recent decades (FAO 2016b; Pauly and Zeller 2016). The availability of diesel-powered vessels and sonar technology after World War II facilitated the development of distant-water fishing fleets by the United States, Japan, China, the Soviet Union/Russia, Taiwan, South Korea, Spain, and France. As their name implies, distant-water fleets fish away from their country’s waters in international seas and in the maritime zones of foreign nations, including those of Ecuador and Peru. However, perceiving the threat of exhaustion of local fisheries resources by distant-water fleets, in 1952 the governments of Chile, Peru and Ecuador signed the “Santiago Declaration on the Maritime Zone,” claiming exclusive sovereignty and jurisdiction over seas extending 200 nautical miles (nm) from each country’s respective coast (Chile Ecuador and Peru 1976). This declaration, however, was not ratified internationally and was largely ineffective in stemming the problem. Following the combined pressure from Asian and African nations, along with others in Latin America (Thorpe and Bennett 2001), the international community agreed on the designation of 200 nm Exclusive Economic Zones (EEZ) of coastal nations in the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea in 1974 (UNCLOS; UN 2019). Under UNCLOS, distant-water fleets may harvest unexploited fish in foreign EEZs if they pay a negotiated fee for access. Bolstered by the newly-established zones, and pressured to harvest domestic stocks to exclude foreign fleets, Ecuador, Peru, and other Latin American nations rapidly developed their own fishing fleets and joined the global fishing nations (Thorpe and Bennett 2001).

The race to capture fish led to governmental fuel subsidies and over-capitalization of the fishing industry and unsustainable harvest of local stocks. Consequently, multiple regional stocks have since been designated “fully exploited,” “overexploited,” or “depleted,” including South Pacific hake Merluccius gayi, mackerels Trachurus picturatus, Trachurus murphyi and Scomber japonicus, and South American pilchard Sardinops sagax (FAO 2016a, b). Other relevant regional pelagic fisheries include those of sharks and tunas, and more recently the rise of the dolphinfish Coryphaena hippurus and giant squid Dosidicus gigas fisheries (Argüelles et al. 2008; Del Solar et al. 2017).

The decline of stocks due to unsustainable fishing is further compounded by the forecasted deleterious effects of climate change (Defeo et al. 2013; Dueri et al. 2014) and by the global challenge of Illegal, Unreported, and Unregulated (IUU) fishing. IUU fishing relates to unsustainable harvest practices and is linked to organized crime. Its products infiltrate fish and fishmeal distribution channels, particularly in developing countries with low levels of governance (Agnew et al. 2009). The mislabelling of seafood products contributes to cover this malpractice from consumers (Cawthorn et al. 2018; Grillo et al. 2018). As a response, some of the main fish importers in the European Union and United States are improving their standards of seafood traceability (Willette and Cheng 2018).

In this context, the UN Agreement on Port State Measures to combat IUU fishing (FAO 2009) defines the route for national governments to develop more efficient control systems and improve their legislation and the procedures used to detect IUU fishing. This approach targets industrial vessels that land their catch in major ports but does not include small-scale fisheries. Thus, different approaches are needed to improve seafood traceability across fisheries sectors. For Ecuador and Peru, both industrial and artisanal fishing are important contributors to the national economy and food security. In the following sections, we will present arguments in favor of strengthening cooperation between these countries in order to meet the challenges of IUU fishing, market competitiveness and local food security.

2 Historical Development of Fisheries Management and Coastal Conservation in Ecuador and Peru

Ecuador possesses a continental EEZ and an insular EEZ surrounding the Galapagos Archipelago, with marine conservation and fisheries management efforts having historically focused on the Galapagos region. In contrast, Peru has a single, continuous EEZ with no islands located far from the coastline (Fig. 15.1). Both countries exploit their marine resources in open access regimes, and largely depend on extractive, export-oriented economies.

Fig. 15.1
A map of Ecuadorian Peruvian coast's biogeographic and political subdivisions exhibits 8 areas of ecoregion. An inset map on the lower left highlights Ecuador and Peru on the map of South America.

Biogeographic and political subdivisions off the Ecuadorian Peruvian coast (Spalding Mark et al. 2007).

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The first initiative to protect marine biodiversity in Ecuador occurred in 1934 when the Galapagos Archipelago was declared a “conservation area” (Varea 2004). The oldest institutions conducting research for the conservation of the Galapagos Islands are the Galapagos National Park Directorate (GNPD), created by the Ecuadorian government, and the Charles Darwin Foundation, both founded in 1959 (see Box 15.1). Meanwhile, marine conservation in Peru started in 1958, with measures to maintain guano exploitation (i.e., bird excrement from coastal capes, exported as fertilizer). The state prohibited fishing nearby the capes because the activity—in combination with El Niño events, (see Cushman 2003)—was reducing the birds’ source of food, anchoveta Engraulis ringens. Currently, the National Reserve of Guano Islands, Islets and Capes System allows ecosystem-based management and resource use around these highly productive areas.

The 1950s saw the rise of industrial fisheries in Ecuador and Peru. In Ecuador, the shrimp trawl fishery began in this decade and eventually entered in conflict with coastal communities for the use of ancestral fishing grounds and high rates of bycatch. In 2012, the shrimp-trawl fishery was officially closed (MAE 2012). In Peru, the industrial fishing of anchoveta started in 1952 (Mendo and Claudia 2016). For a long time, this was the most important economic activity associated to the sea. Anchoveta stocks collapsed in the early 1970s but measures were taken and the fishery is today one of the largest single-species and best-managed fisheries in the world (Chavez et al. 2008; Tarazona and Arntz 2001).

During the 1970s, mangrove deforestation for shrimp farming prevailed in Ecuador and Northern Peru. The process started in Ecuador early in the decade and affected the traditional fishing communities depending on crustaceans, molluscs, and fish (Terán et al. 2007). The mangrove forest ecological reserve Manglares Churute was created in Ecuador in 1979 to counter this process. During the 1990s, the Ecuadorian government adopted the strategy of managing mangrove forests through concessions assigned to legally constituted fishing associations. Similarly, the Peruvian State initiated a series of experiments in shrimp aquaculture in 1970, and by 1978 it allowed the private sector to take part. For Peru, shrimp aquaculture was an alternative to the recently collapsed anchoveta fishery, but it was also motivated by a shift toward a liberal economy. Shrimp production in Peru has increased ever since, despite disastrous El Niño events in 1982–1983 and 1997–1998, which destroyed ponds, channels, and facilities (Mialhe et al. 2013). In 1988 the Sanctuary “Los Manglares de Tumbes” was created as an important natural reserve to protect the mangrove forests of northern Peru in response to the growth of unregulated shrimp farming in the area (INRENA 2002). However, its management is still challenging due to contamination, deforestation, aquaculture, agriculture and urban expansion, added to information gaps that deter decision-making (Flores et al. 2013). Ecuador is currently the second largest exporter of frozen shrimp after India, while Peru occupies the 13th place (Workman 2019).

During the 1980s the artisanal fishing fleet of Ecuador experienced a significant development of its capacity to reach fishing areas outside the continental platform. In 1989, the National Fisheries Institute (INP) of Ecuador started monitoring the main artisanal fishing ports along the coast, collecting information about landings, fishing effort and biological data about the main target species (Peralta 2009).

The signing of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) in Rio 1992 had a positive effect on conservation efforts in Ecuador, although not immediately. In 2000, stakeholders from the coastal region engaged with the Ministry of Environment, exerting pressure for the declaration of a series of coastal marine protected areas. However, a study of biodiversity conservation gaps and priorities in continental Ecuador concluded that the existing protected areas failed to cover and represent the different ecosystem types, particularly, the marine ecosystems (Terán et al. 2007). A portfolio of potential conservation areas resulting from the study was included in the National Strategy for Biodiversity 2015–2030 to guide the development and expansion of the National System of Protected Areas (MAE 2016).

In Peru, the creation of the Peruvian Ministry of Environment in 2008 constituted a turning point from fisheries-oriented coastal zone management, toward ecosystem-based management. The current policy for integrated coastal zone management (Ministerio del Ambiente 2016) was assessed by Barragan and Lazo in 2018. The authors explain that the State has recently included coastal zone management in the political agenda, but only as a bottom-up process. They consider that this is an incomplete approach, lacking a clear description of the role of the State in supporting coastal communities in policy implementation, and in facilitating the advance of regions and districts. Therefore, Peru is considered to be in a transition toward a more integrated model but still with a long way to go. For instance, it has been suggested that the marine nature of the Guano Islands and Capes system should be complemented with a protected terrestrial coast strip that would act as a coastal ecological corridor, but this is not yet included in official plans (Barragán and Lazo 2018).

In summary, Ecuador and Peru have had similar, parallel processes of natural resource exploitation in marine and coastal ecosystems. Both have significant environmental sustainability challenges and therefore national policies are now turning toward ecosystem-based management.

Box 15.1 Fisheries Management in Galapagos, Ecuador

The importance of Galapagos for global marine biodiversity has been widely recognized: UNESCO World Heritage Site (1978), Biosphere Reserve and Whale Sanctuary (1985), and Shark Sanctuary (2016). However, multiple drivers of environmental degradation are still acting, including biological invasions and extinctions, overfishing, massive tourism, and contamination (see Wolff and Gardener 2012).

The Galapagos Marine Reserve (GMR) is a multi-use oceanic protected area of ~138,000 km2 from a 40 nm buffer measured from the baseline around of the archipelago and its inland waters. Industrial fishing was prohibited in 1998 by the Special Law for Galapagos, and its special regulation for fishing activity. However, industrial fishing has been displaced outside the boundaries of the GMR. The local artisanal fishery is the only permitted and managed by GNPD and takes place in 99% of the GMR (Moity et al. 2018). Measures to reduce the fishing effort and pressure on coastal and demersal fish include the use of anchored fish aggregation devices (FADs). These are being evaluated as sustainable alternatives for the fishing sector. Evidence shows that the GMR had a positive effect on industrial fisheries targeting yellowfin and skipjack tuna during the first decade of operation (Wolff et al. 2012), whereas the sustainability of industrial fisheries operating outside the GMR is threatened by the overuse of FADs (Bucaram et al. 2017).

Despite management efforts and the existence of a muti-stakeholder management board (“Junta de manejo participativo”), the threat of illegal fishing is still real for Galapagos. In 2017, a Chinese-flag fishing vessel was caught inside the GMR containing 300 tons of protected species, including hammerhead sharks (EFE 2017). More recently, the Ecuadorian Navy caught four fishing vessels manned by Peruvian crews inside the Galapagos EEZ, once again, targeting protected shark species (El Comercio 2019). The illegal entry of industrial vessels is evident, especially long-liners (Carr et al. 2013; Jacquet et al. 2008). Long-line fishing is not a sustainable option for Galapagos, where marine-based tourism is related to megafauna sighting (Cerutti-Pereyra et al. 2019; Moity and Izurieta 2017). In addition, marine-based tourism represents the biggest economic revenue (58%) (Lynham et al. 2015) in the GMR. Other illegal activities such as fishing inside no-take zones, targeting species in closed seasons and using banned fishing gear are daily local challenges.

Although small-scale fishing practices and management are different between Ecuador mainland and the Galapagos Archipelago, governance problems persist in both sub-regions due to incongruent jurisdictional and legal frameworks, and a lack of attention to the social and cultural dimensions of fisheries governance (Barragán Paladines 2015).

3 A Continuous Environment Across Political Borders

Marine ecology around the political border between Ecuador and Peru is highly dynamic due to the proximity of three biogeochemical provinces: the Central American Coastal Province, which extends from Baja California to the Gulf of Guayaquil, in Ecuador; the Humboldt Current Coastal Province which covers the coastal waters off Chile and Peru from 40–45 to 5°S; and the Pacific Equatorial Divergence Province, dominated by the South Equatorial Current west of the Galapagos Archipelago (Longhurst 1998). The exact latitudinal extent of these provinces is subject to variations associated with the El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO). Additionally, this political border is located inside the Tropical East Pacific—Guayaquil biogeographic ecoregion (Spalding Mark et al. 2007), dominated by the Gulf of Guayaquil, the largest estuary in the Pacific coast of South America (Fig. 15.1).

The predominant feature throughout this region is the presence of the Humboldt Current (HC)—the most productive eastern boundary current system in terms of fish production (Mendo and Claudia 2016; Miloslavich et al. 2011). The northern coast of Peru is particularly productive in this sense. For example, the Region of Piura represents only 10% of the Peruvian coastline but hosts ~30% of all fishers and ~35% of all artisanal boats and small-scale vessels (Guevara-Carrasco and Bertrand 2017). In the HC system, upwelling of cold water sustains a highly productive plankton community, which in turn supports a high biomass of small pelagic fish (mainly anchovies and sardines) and top predators feeding on them. However, during ENSO’s warm phases, the upwelling current brings warm, nutrient-poor but oxygen-enriched water from offshore and from equatorial latitudes (Taylor et al. 2008). This generates a disruption of the food chain that cascades all the way from the phytoplankton through herbivores and leads to the drastic reduction of pelagic fish stocks (Longhurst 1998).

The environmental oscillation between ENSO’s warm and cold phases also causes changes in the composition of the marine communities for a given latitude (IOC 1989). For instance, warm phases have been associated with a decrease in catches of Engraulis ringens, Merluccius gayi peruanus, Aulacomya ater, and increases of Trachurus picturatus murphyi, Octopus spp., and Penaeus spp.; additionally, the fisheries have shown a trend from mono- to multi-specific catches (Badjeck 2008) during these times. In the case of the highly valued scallop Argopecten purpuratus, warmer waters have increased catches almost 50-fold in the Ica Region, central Peru, which lies under typical upwelling conditions (~14°S). On the other hand, scallop stocks collapse around 4°S, due to increased rainfall that leads to decreased salinity and higher discharge of particulate matter (Mendo et al. 2008; Taylor et al. 2008; Wolff 1987). Similarly, Ecuadorian waters are also heavily affected by ENSO and the HC’s upwelling system, as documented in studies of periodic modifications of ocean biogeochemistry (Borbor-Cordova et al. 2019; Wolff 2010).

4 Fishing Target Species Common to Ecuador and Peru

This section presents the biodiversity of fishery resources that have been documented both in Ecuador and Peru. It is supported by a list of species (see Appendix) compiled using public information in English and Spanish. Species were included in this list based on their latitudinal distribution across the political border and after confirmation of their presence in both countries from the literature. Taxonomic synonymy was checked using online databases (Maddison et al. 2007) and conservation status was retrieved from IUCN (2019). The compiled list consists of 117 species, including fishes (95 spp.), crustaceans (16 spp.), and molluscs (6 spp.).

There is a considerable gap of knowledge in terms of IUCN categories as 35.8% of the list corresponds to species not assessed, or data deficient (Fig. 15.2). The largest gap is among benthic species. Demersal species are mostly under the least concern category, but also include the majority of data deficiency cases. More than half the pelagic species are in threatened categories.

Fig. 15.2
A circular diagram of 117 fishing-target species in Ecuador and Peru. It is divided into 2 hemispheres, the left hemisphere contains benthic, demersal, pelagic, and the right hemisphere contains not assessed, data deficient, least concern, vulnerable, near threatened, and endangered.

Two-variable circular diagram built with information from 117 fishing-target species reported both in Ecuador and Peru. The first variable is ecological distribution (benthic, demersal, pelagic)—represented on the left hemisphere. The right hemisphere contains the second variable: threat categories from least to most (NA not assessed, DD data deficient, LC least concern, VU vulnerable, NT near threatened, EN endangered IUCN 2019). Bands connecting both sides represent the proportion of species in each combination. Number of species in each category is written next to the category’s name. Percentages of species in each subcategory are colored on peripheral scales (e.g., demersal and LC: 62%). Diagram generated with Circos Table Viewer (Krzywinski et al. 2009)

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4.1 Threatened Species by Large-Scale Distribution

Coastal Species

The coastal zone contains the largest proportion of species in the total list (66.7%). Almost half of coastal species are in the low-concern category, but the population trends are unknown for the majority (78.2%). Two rays (Rhinobatos leucorhynchus, Myliobatis longirostris), and two sharks (Squatina californica, Mustelus mento) are near threatened, while three other shark species (Galeorhinus galeus, Mustelus whitneyi, Triakis maculata) are considered vulnerable.

Oceanic Species

Oceanic waters are occupied by 21.4% of the species in the list. Population trends are known for 76.0% and decreasing for 64.0% of oceanic species. Eleven species of rays (genus Mobula), sharks (genera Carcharhinus, Rhincodon, Isurus, Sphyrna, Alopias) and tuna (Thunnus orientalis, T. obsesus), and billfishes (Makaira mazara, Istiompax indica, Kajikia audax, Xiphias gladius) are either vulnerable or endangered.

Semi-oceanic Species

The semi-oceanic species account for 11.9% of our list, including one ray (Mobula tarapacana) and 13 sharks. The near threatened species are Carcharhinus galapagensis, C. limbatus, C. brachyurus, C. leucas and Galeocerdo cuvier, the vulnerable species are M. tarapacana and Carcharhinus falciformis, and the endangered species are Sphyrna mokarran and S. lewini. The population trends are unknown for 71.4% of the semi-oceanic species reported.

4.2 Major Fishing Targets and Shared Stocks

Ten species from our list—nine fishes and one squid—were found among the major targets for marine fisheries between 1950 and 2010 (Table 15.1), according to catch reconstructions for Ecuador (Alava et al. 2016; Schiller et al. 2016) and Peru (Mendo and Claudia 2016). In five of these cases, Ecuador and Peru exploited the same stocks. Nowadays, Jumbo flying squid and Pacific sardine are marginal fisheries in Ecuador, while Chilean jack mackerel is developing (Pablo Guerrero, personal communication).

Table 15.1 Major species in catch reconstructions from 1950 to 2010, present in Ecuador and Peru
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The most important shared stocks are currently those of tropical tunas (Thunnus obesus, T. albacares, and Katsuwonus pelamis), Chilean jack mackerel (Trachurus murphiyi), and dolphinfish (Coryphaena hippurus; Pablo Guerrero, personal communication). Ecuador and Peru seek to coordinate research and management measures for these stocks through different mechanisms. Tropical tunas and dolphinfish are managed through the Inter-American Tropical Tuna Commission (IATTC), while Chilean Jack mackerel is managed through the South Pacific Regional Fisheries Management Organization (SP-RFMO).

5 Economic and Societal Value of Fishery in Ecuador and Peru

Ecuador and Peru are among the top 25 nations in the world for landed value of fish and fisheries products (FAO 2016b). They are located in the FAO major fishing area 87 (Pacific, SE) where the percentage of overfished stocks is estimated at 41%, and the rate of IUU fishing at 19% (Cawthorn et al. 2018). During 2014, Ecuador contributed with 0.8% of the total global marine captures, while Peru represented 4.4% in total, and 1.5% excluding anchoveta. Peru is around three times larger than Ecuador in area, coastline length and population size, and marine fishing catches in Peru are around one order of magnitude higher to those of Ecuador (Table 15.2). Fishing has been an essential subsistence activity for local coastal populations in this region since pre-Columbian times (see Béarez et al. 2012).

Table 15.2 Comparative summary of marine fisheries statistics from Ecuador and Peru
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Industrial fisheries are key economic sectors in Ecuador and Peru. Ecuador is the highest tuna producer in the Eastern Pacific Ocean (EPO). The port of Manta takes the largest amount of tuna landed by the industrial purse seine fleet in the EPO (Martínez-Ortiz et al. 2015). Ecuador exports 80% of its industrial fisheries products, mainly to Europe, the United States, China, Japan, Colombia, and Mexico (Ecuador Pesquero 2017). Likewise, Peru has the world’s biggest single-species industrial fishery of anchoveta Engraulis ringens for the production of fishmeal (Christensen et al. 2014). Industrial purse seine fisheries targeting anchoveta contribute to up to 30% of the GDP generated by the fishery sector in Peru.

Fishmeal production is another activity the two nations have in common. Peru is the largest fishmeal producer in the world (FAO 2014; Grillo et al. 2018) and Ecuador is currently ranked 13th for this commodity (Index Mundi 2019). Fishmeal production is principally related with industrial fishing as most fishmeal comes from small-pelagic species and fish residues from the industrial sector. Yet there are reports of fishmeal-processing facilities lacking official registry and buying prime materials from IUU fishing activities to cover market demands. This way, illegal fishmeal infiltrates processing and trade chains of balanced meal in Peru and Ecuador (Grillo et al. 2018). Furthermore, some of it is then transported from Peru to Ecuador to satisfy shrimp farms’ high demand for preparing animal feed. Poor traceability of fishmeal represents a competitive disadvantage for both countries in international markets (Cawthorn et al. 2018; Trujillo 2017).

Artisanal and small-scale fisheries represent the main source of fish for local and national markets in Ecuador and Peru, but have long been overlooked in national policies (Arellano and Swartzman 2010; MAE 2010).

In Peru, fish represents 26% of the animal protein in domestic human consumption (Béné 2006)—among the highest in the world—and small-scale fisheries provide four times more employment than the industrial sector (Alvarez 2003). Additionally, artisanal purse seine, squid boats (and other artisanal subsectors including mariculture) contribute with more than 60% of the fisheries’ GDP, and generate more than 75% of the total employment (Christensen et al. 2014). Such statistics are unclear in Ecuador because the artisanal fishing sector has been poorly monitored and managed, particularly in continental waters (Alava et al. 2016; Barragán and Lazo 2018).

Management measures for artisanal fisheries are different in each country. In Ecuador, artisanal fishing has an exclusive zone of up to 8 nm from the coastline, while in Peru this is up to 5 nm. Artisanal fishing often occurs beyond that limit and even outside the EEZ’s boundaries, either to target oceanic species (e.g., dolphinfish, tuna, billfish, sharks), or because other target species are becoming more scarce in near shore areas (Guevara-Carrasco and Bertrand 2017; Martínez-Ortiz et al. 2015). The multi-gear, multi-species nature of these fisheries further complicates their monitoring and regulation. Moreover, artisanal fishers tend to rotate efforts among fishing grounds and chase migrating fish (i.e., ontogenetically, seasonally, or on the search for food), resulting in longitudinal and latitudinal displacements. This becomes particularly problematic for communities located close to the bi-national frontier, because fishers become illegal as soon as they cross the invisible political boundary. This has created conflicts between local authorities and communities in both countries, yet fishers have organized bi-national meetings on either side of the border to address this situation.

6 Antecedents of Bi-national Cooperation Between Ecuador and Peru

As noted in Sect. 1, Ecuador and Peru have a common history of cooperation in marine affairs, despite the territorial conflicts that occurred during the twentieth century. They are partners alongside Colombia and Chile in the Permanent Commission of the Southeast Pacific (CPPS), established in 1952 (Barragán and Lazo 2018). In 1989, scientists from the CPPS countries participated in a workshop to analyze the biological effects of ENSO in the region and identified an “alarming” lack of knowledge exchange among fisheries researchers (IOC 1989). In 2010, the CPPS developed the Regional Action Plan for the conservation of sharks, rays, and chimeras, which allowed these countries to aim for common goals. As it is common with other regional plans, adequate operationalization has been one of the main issues to tackle.

International organizations for fisheries management (e.g. SP-RFMO, IATTC) have allowed a better coordination of actions and policies between Ecuador and Peru. Despite these regional organizations involving several parties, Ecuador and Peru have worked more closely to establish common strategies for the most important shared stocks. The clearest example is that of dolphinfish fisheries management which has been addressed within the IATTC since proposed by Ecuador in 2012. Dolphinfish is highly relevant for Ecuador and Peru because together they produce around 90% of the catches from the Eastern Pacific (Pablo Guerrero, personal communication). Similarly, Ecuador posed another request in the 2019 SP-RFMO meeting, asking Peru to approve an increase in the fishing quota over the Chilean jack mackerel stock. This request was supported by other parties in the organization (El Telégrafo 2019).

In 2014, Ecuador and Peru signed an agreement toward bi-national management of protected areas, followed by meetings, projects, and a common fund (Plan Binacional Peru-Ecuador 2018). Then the National Institute of Fisheries in Ecuador (INP, renamed in 2020 as the Public Institute of Fisheries and Aquaculture Research IPIAP) and the Institute of the Sea of Peru (IMARPE) started working on a joint model of stock assessment for dolphinfish. The same year, hundreds of fishers from both countries gathered for the I Binational Congress for Responsible Artisanal Fisheries, in Lobitos (Piura, Peru). A second congress took place in Huaquillas (El Oro, Ecuador) in 2015. Since then, further initiatives have been working toward a bi-national strategy for responsible fisheries—although this is still unofficial. The growing number of cooperation initiatives between both countries, and the fact that they are coming from “top-down” and from “bottom-up,” makes this a particularly important time for developing and formalizing this strategy between the two countries. More bi-national agreements have been recently signed in the same direction (El Universo 2019).

A very relevant and important agreement has to do with the launch in 2017 of a 5-year project led by the UN’s Development Fund (UNDP), in collaboration with the NGOs Conservation International (CI) and the Worldwide Fund for Nature (WWF). The project is part of FAO’s Coastal Fisheries Initiative Latin America (CFI-LA), which is funded by the Global Environment Facility (GEF) as “a global effort to preserve marine resources and ensure that coastal fisheries can continue to play their crucial role in society, contributing to food security, as well as economic and social development.” It focuses on the following main areas: (1) ecosystem-based, collaborative fisheries management and governance of the following fisheries: mahi-mahi, hake, shrimps, mangrove crabs and cockles, and pole and line tuna; (2) marine spatial planning in the Bay of Sechura in Peru and the Gulf of Guayaquil in Ecuador; and (3) sharing knowledge to develop more holistic processes and integrated approaches to coastal fisheries management. It is worth noting that even when this CFI project includes both countries, each working group is independently managing and developing their tasks toward their particular targets, which might break the whole meaning of bi-national collaboration. At present, the project is yet to produce its final result, so it is not clear if an internal collaboration between countries will arise in the end.

7 Challenges and Needs for Trans-boundary Collaboration Towards Sustainable Fisheries Management

In this chapter, different aspects common to Ecuador and Peru in relation to their coastal and marine resources have been described. Special focus has been given to fishery resources due to their essential role in economic and social development, at the local and national levels. The fishing sectors of both countries demand attention and support from different segments of society in order to enhance their transformation into sustainable systems, capable of adapting to global change and thriving over crisis.

Sustainability is a continuous process that allows the use of a resource without compromising its availability for future generations (Hilborn et al. 2015). In particular, seafood sustainability requires understanding how people affect and respond to ecosystem processes—in other words, understanding fisheries as social-ecological systems that emerge from resource use. The basic elements for sustainable management are: (a) specific objectives and targets for fishing pressure and abundance, (b) monitoring of fishing pressure and abundance, (c) assessments to determine if targets are being met, (d) feedback management systems that adjust regulations in response to the assessments and in particular restrict fishing pressure when it is too high, and (e) enforcement systems to assure compliance with regulations (Hilborn et al. 2015). According to our review, regional organizations (e.g., CIAT) offer a platform for the application of those elements to trans-boundary fisheries management between Ecuador and Peru (Sect. 6)—but equivalent spaces are still needed to address the transformation of small-scale fisheries.

Transformation of fisheries’ socio-ecosystems toward sustainability requires action in three equally relevant dimensions: environmental protection, social development, and economic growth (Hilborn et al. 2015). The main challenges faced by Ecuador and Peru in these areas are also those of many developing countries: prevent overfishing, preserve mangrove ecosystems, combat IUU fishing, increase seafood traceability, strengthen fishing associations, visualize women’s participation, protect environmental services, among others. In addition, climate change is a transversal component because it is fundamental to know the impact of this global threat on fishing target species, ecosystems and coastal communities. Given the similarities between Ecuador and Peru and the resources they have in common, we argue that some challenges could be better addressed by means of official bi-national cooperation, while others could benefit from academic cooperation and knowledge exchange among stakeholders from both countries. A detailed classification and association of challenges, needs, and prospective collaborators is presented in Fig. 15.3.

Fig. 15.3
An alluvial diagram of the 3 aspects of sustainability namely challenges, needs, and prospective collaborators. The challenges are economic growth, social development, and environmental protection, the needs are binational agreement, stakeholders communication, transparency, and research priorities, and the collaborators are association and government, academia and government, and academia and association.

Multi-category alluvial diagram illustrating three primary Aspects of Sustainability and the associated challenges and needs to reach a more sustainable fisheries sector. Prospective collaborators are indicated to meet the challenges and needs for sustainability. Diagram generated in RAWGraphs (Mauri et al. 2017)

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Challenges around economic growth in the fishing sector (Fig. 15.3) involve the transformation of value chains into more inclusive and competitive ones. Progress in this aspect can be reached through reduced bycatch rates and increased seafood traceability, which in turn, allow access to markets with strict sustainability standards. Such a goal can be supported by the application of emergent methods and technologies like molecular tools for assessing fishery activity and fish traceability along the value chain. On the other hand, inclusiveness implies recognizing the importance of women and their role within the value chain of marine resources, which can be promoted through bi-national studies and workshops similar to those conducted by fishing associations in recent years (Sect. 6). The situation around illegal fishmeal production and its commercialization (Sect. 5) represents a clear opportunity for both countries to join efforts in solving a common problem.

In terms of social development (Fig. 15.3), there are challenges related with social organization and equal access to basic rights, and challenges related with effective stocks management. Empowering women and fishing associations is necessary to support the rights of local communities and their participation during decision-making processes. Governments can foster such processes by facilitating the exchange of experiences among organizations from the region in the context of bi-national workshops and assist organizations with capacity building in governance. Moreover, bi-national cooperation is essential for the definition of science-based management measures for shared stocks of migratory species, which currently differ from country to country (e.g., dolphinfish ban periods, minimum and maximum catch size, regulations on elasmobranchs and sailfishes). This implies collaboration in fisheries research, agreement on common management measures, and coordination of enforcement procedures.

General challenges in the environmental protection component are related to the prevention of habitat degradation and regulation of resource use. Habitat degradation through direct (e.g., mangrove deforestation) and indirect (e.g., upstream contamination) impacts affects seafood quality and safety. Indeed, water quality assessments are urgent in the border zone as reported concentrations of heavy metals in seafood samples have been above safety levels for human consumption across the Gulf of Guayaquil in Ecuador (Navarrete-Forero et al. 2019). Similar situations potentially occur on the Peruvian side due to widespread gold mining activities in the Andean region. In addition, our analysis of IUCN threat categories (Sect. 4) shows significant knowledge gaps for certain ecological groups, particularly among benthic species that are the basis for livelihoods in mangrove ecosystems. In this context, scientific cooperation is needed in order to assess populations in their natural distribution and not as separate entities based on a political boundary.

Another field for scientific collaboration included in the environmental protection component is the fight against IUU fishing. The multiple effects of IUU fishing on the ecosystem, society and economy justify its consideration as a target for bi-national cooperation. This requires basic scientific research about population genetics, but also applied research to develop tools for enforcement procedures and increase transparency in their application.

Perhaps the greatest challenge in this context is to develop governability across scales in the fishery sector, which would allow the effective implementation of sustainable management strategies. Bi-national agreements are valuable for addressing the biggest challenges such as the fight against IUU fishing, which need coordination among multiple institutions and stakeholders. However, no strategy can be effectively applied without local governance and resource users’ compliance. Therefore, different sectors of society should join the task and support small-scale fishing associations in their empowerment processes. We consider that while a legal framework for bi-national cooperation at the national government level is necessary (Nikanorova and Egorov 2019), it is also possible to establish cooperation through interdisciplinary research networks between both countries, and even from countries where the fishery products are consumed. This sort of bottom-up pressure can encourage further collaboration at higher levels of governance or at regional platforms, and its influence in the transformation of fisheries socio-ecosystems should not be underestimated.