Another important facet of these exercises is the spotting of the target population. In this context we may have to evolve a strategy targeting the individual as well as his family. Socio- cultural information necessarily happens to be a collation of data on a subject and his/her social grouping (household/ family). A portion of the information is devoted towards assessing towards the combined status of the group (above poverty line/ below poverty line etc). Still within the family individuals will have more than one façade to show. That is the family, at least one member of which is a fisher, can have income from other vocations also. It may be that the individual has taken to fishing as a matter of compulsion than tradition. He or she may not also be the head of the family. Who knows he or she may be the worst off in the family. Information can be collected about them also. But in the hindsight what these figures have to do with the prime objective? If the prime objective is to simply get the number of persons involved in the core activity in the whole country then the mere inclusion of such individual as a count may be with the additional information on his gender and community will fit the bill very cleanly. But if we have to provide information on the individual's economic and social condition vis-a-vis government's welfare dossier, then the whole family has to be projected alongside the individual. Probably there may be scenarios where poor individual from a rich family (?) should not be getting a particular benefit. Another interesting aspect is to trace the economic progression of traditional fisher folks. A simple glance at there infrastructure (including crafts) and the educational status of their family members, this can be easily assessed. This is more interesting if the Census exercise is to be done at regular intervals. But in all these cases, the vexing is issue is how to zero in on them? Whether to focus only their habitats or to focus the crafts in operation is a major poser. As the information has to be first hand the individual has to be contacted or at least his family. Probably the listed fishermen of previous such exercises would be a very good starting point. This issue is of very high importance and sensitivity in countries where access to seas is open, registration of vessels/ crafts is yet to be complete and licensing to fishing is still having the birth pangs.
Sunday, August 2, 2009
Getting a frame of fishing populace of a country
Census operations have been in existence from time immemorial. Probably General Census which are mostly decennial as in India is one grand exercise which is based on simple conceptualisation. Reach out to every citizen of the country within a specified time interval. The catch points are "individual" and "time period". All other information fall in place smoothly alongside these two pivots. The classic census exercise involves collection of socio-cultural, economic and infrastructural details of persons/ groups of co-existing individuals or families. The greatest strength in this exercise is that there is no ambiguity on who is to be approached. But if the complete enumeration is to cover a certain portion of the population of citizens of a country the spadework becomes huge. As mentioned in the other post, "whom to be considered and contacted to represent the fishing population of a country?" is the first question to be answered.
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Each state fisheries department has a list of marine fishing villages. Reqeuest them the list. Also, find out how they define or identify a marine fisher. Check the list with the available list from the privious census. If they tally, fine. If not clarify with the state fisheries dept. I think this will give a fairly good idea about the frame.
ReplyDeleteSimultaneously, employ the field staff to physically verify the list of villages. It may take a month or two in each state(depending upon the size). We did this during the last census. There should be a provision for this preliminary 'frame validation survey' in your census budget. This could be a tricky affair especially in big port cities, where marine fisherfolk are spread in different (but identifiable) wards. Survey of craft in the fishery (especially mechanised craft such as trawlers)is a rather difficult exercise, as we found out last time. You should be clear about what you want to survey whether 1) survey of craft owned or shared by the marine fisherfolk families or 2)survey of craft in the fishery as whole( some of the boat owners may not be fisherfolk may be city (town)dwellers or may be living inland)
or both.
If both, then 2) can be done by carrying out a simultaneous survey at the same time ( preferbly in one or two days)at all the landing centres of the country. Even this may not give an accurate count of crats which conduct voyage fishing. You may obtain the information on voyage fishing boats(on a given day) by enquiry only. Classification of mechanised boats by size and HP perhaps may be made on a sample basis.
1) can be collected during the regular household survey and for non voyage and non mechanised or traditional craft the information could be reasonably accurate, provided the information is properly elicited.
Ofcourse, the core issue is proper identification of marine fisherfolk households, this can be possible only with the co-operation of the locals and local officials.
Dr Srinath's piece admirably puts a plan worthy of action. I for one personally feel that this is the only possible safe mechanism. But during the course of discussion ideas like snowballing on the fisher starting from ground zero ie landing centre/ harbour as well as perusal of the registration and other similar records available with ports and small ports would help in a better way. I think at the end of the effort we should have a clear idea about the fishing potential of the country (in terms of crafts) which obviously should include those in action as well as those in hibernation.
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