This project will analyze how the expansion of tourism into rural coastal regions is changing the dynamics of human-environment interactions and livelihoods related to small-scale fisheries. Overlooked for decades due to their small and informal nature, small-scale fisheries have increasingly garnered attention as their socio-economic importance and ecological impact is better understood. In rural coastal ecosystems, small-scale fisheries are often a primary source of livelihoods, protein, and micronutrients for local populations and can be the dominant form of marine resource-use. Globally they account for up to a third of global fisheries catches, and provide 50% of the seafood caught for human consumption. Small-scale fisheries are disproportionately concentrated in lower-income regions where their importance to coastal communities is amplified by isolation and poverty, and high resource dependence and limited environmental management make ecosystems vulnerable to over exploitation. In many of these areas tourism is viewed as a pathway for sustainable development, with the hope that new livelihood opportunities will elevate the socioeconomic wellbeing of the community and reduce pressure on natural resources. Despite the potential for such development, research increasingly shows that the socio-economic and ecological implications of these livelihood transitions vary widely, creating a disconnect between conservation and development planning and actual social and environmental outcomes. Understanding the mechanisms of how tourism affects coastal socio-ecological systems will enable governments, managers, and communities to anticipate the positive and negative impacts of tourism development, and be more prepared to strategically mitigate or counteract the negative aspects. The project will also contribute to the training of a doctoral student.
This research will investigate how the availability of alternative livelihoods changes fishing behavior; how the influx of tourists changes the demand for and local consumption of seafood; and how these changes affect community and household socio-economic status and food security and impact marine resources. Although this research project will focus on a case study in Colombia, the research will provide new insights and approaches for dealing with tourism's impacts in many other countries, including the United States. The research will be conducted in eight communities on the Pacific Coast of Colombia that are being transformed through tourism development. These communities share similar sociocultural heritage and exist within a connected ecosystem, but differ in the extent and nature of tourism development, allowing for a side-by-side comparison of the livelihood transition and social and ecological consequences of tourism development. Interviews, observation, and archival research will be used to build upon previous fieldwork in order to contextualize, clarify, and probe the causality of relationships that emerged in the analysis of quantitative household surveys.
