Lead UD; Co-lead: NIBIO; Other partners: Community Organizations in Tanzania & Ghana, UCC, SUA
Background
Ghana and Tanzania offer complementary sites to understand pressures and dependence on mangrove resources. Previous work has shown the importance of tenure [14] and community forest management [27] in maintaining mangrove areas. With climate change negatively impacting yields from agriculture and fishing, vulnerable communities may grow more dependent on mangrove resources to augment lost incomes, driving further degradation [13]; [15]. In addition, rising youth populations across Africa [28] are experiencing high unemployment rates with many young people ‘stuck’ or hustling to survive [29,30].
Rural youth poverty remains pervasive and research with rural youth often takes poverty as a given focusing on livelihood strategies and how the causes might be addressed [31]. Rarely is youth (and the wider community) poverty considered alongside the ecological fragility of the locations in which they reside and the tensions between survival now versus the future when deciding to restore fragile ecosystems. This project and WP seek to bridge this divide by working with communities, youth in particular, to explore the tension, seek meaningful solutions and strategies for positive outcomes for both mangrove ecosystems and sustainable community livelihoods. Finally, this WP will benefit from mapping and assessment of climate change impacts from WP1 to mangrove areas that will provide communities context for discussing mangrove restoration and future livelihoods and food security.
Objectives:
- Document current reliance on mangroves by local communities, their contribution to livelihoods and food security as well as understanding future trajectories in the context of a changing climate
- Explore co-benefits and/or trade-offs communities experience from mangrove restoration and conservation.
Outcome
Support locally-led social-ecological and climate resilience through coordinated management of mangrove resources.
Output 2.1: Food security, livelihood analysis and impact assessment.
Output 2.2: Youth-led Data Collection and Story Maps.
Research Methodology and Design
Study sites, data and data sources: To achieve important contrasts on known drivers of mangrove conservation outlined above, we will study two sites in each country, four sites total. We will work in established study sites, guided by local partners, in East and Western Ghana with contrasting land tenure regimes and pilot coastal Community Resources Management Areas (CREMA).
In Tanzania, we intend to work in the extensive mangrove area of the Rufiji Delta, with higher pressure from agriculture, and the mangrove areas of Zanzibar, where eco-tourism is more prevalent. In Ghana, the project will work in The Greater Amanzule Wetland (GAW), which covers an estimated 50,000 hectares of land and water area and is a biologically diverse system comprising freshwater lagoons, rivers and mangrove forests. It has the most extensive remaining stand of intact swamp forest in Ghana and stretches from the Ankobra estuary to the Tanoe–Ehy marshes on Ghana’s southwestern border with Ivory Coast.
Activities
Research activities will begin with a comprehensive literature review culminating in a situational analysis highlighting key findings and research gaps on the intricate interplay between climate change, livelihood and food security. Primary data collection will entail a combination of community mapping surveys, interviews, and six participatory groups per designated coastal community. Participants will be identified across diverse age, gender, economic and livelihood realities and will focus on ecosystem services; livelihoods and mangroves; climate change; barriers to restoration and solutions for the future.
Community mapping surveys will encompass demographics, household dynamics, food production systems, additional sources of nutrition, livelihood assets, income sources and vulnerabilities across social groups. Our inquiry will also encompass an exploration of the adaptive measures undertaken by coastal communities to counterbalance the influence of climate change on their livelihoods. To capture social dynamics during the project, a youth CoastMan team (approx. 6-8 young people aged between 18 and 30) will be appointed in each site to work as key informants alongside the researchers, providing assistance, advice and collaborative engagement with communities.
The youth CoastMan team and key stakeholders will inform development of the survey, to be administered on tablets (using ODK or Survey 123) and undertake the survey with the research team following enumerator training. The youth CoastMan team will support the production of community-level story maps, using ESRI ARC GIS (though EO and social science), to independently identify evidence of changing patterns of mangroves at community sites and develop stories around livelihoods, mangrove-community relationships, challenges, barriers and solutions to co-existence (see [32], [33] these will both be informed by and feed into the decision support maps produced in WP5.
References
- Aheto, D.W., et al., Community-based mangrove forest management: Implications for local livelihoods andcoastal resource conservation along the Volta estuary catchment area of Ghana. Ocean & CoastalManagement, 2016. 127: p. 43-54.14.
- Asante, W.A., et al., The implications of land tenure and ownership regimes on sustainable mangrovemanagement and conservation in two Ramsar sites in Ghana. Forest Policy and Economics, 2017. 85: p.65-75.15.
- Nyangoko, B.P., et al., Socioeconomic determinants of mangrove exploitation and management in thePangani River Estuary, Tanzania. Ecology and Society, 2022. 27(2)
- Hagger, V., et al., Drivers of global mangrove loss and gain in social-ecological systems. Nature Communications, 2022. 13(1).
- van Blerk, L., Where in the world are youth geographies going? Reflections on the journey and directions for the future. Childrens Geographies, 2019. 17(1): p. 32-35.29.
- Stasik, M., V. Hänsch, and D. Mains, Temporalities of waiting in Africa. Critical African Studies, 2020. 12(1):p. 1-9.30.
- Thieme, T.A., The hustle economy: Informality, uncertainty and the geographies of getting by. Progress in Human Geography, 2018. 42(4): p. 529-548.31.
- Ansell, N., et al., Fears for the future: the incommensurability of securitisation and in/securities among southern African youth. Social & Cultural Geography, 2019. 20(4): p. 507-533.32.
- Hunter, J., et al., Learning on Harare’s streets under COVID-19 lockdown: making a story map with street youth. Environment and Urbanization, 2021. 33(1): p. 31-42.33.
- van Blerk, L., et al., Creating stories for impact: Co-producing knowledge with young people through story mapping. Area, 2023. 55(1): p. 99-107.
