Women make up half of the small-scale fisheries work force and serve vital roles from pre- to post-harvest activities. Explore ways to ensure equitable participation and representation in all aspects of small-scale fishing.

Resources

Advancing Gender in the Environment: Gender in Fisheries – A Sea of Opportunity

This guide provides an overview of the unique roles and contributions women make in the wild-caught fisheries sector. The guide also explains how persistent gender inequalities limit women’s economic empowerment, and increased risks of gender-based violence negatively impact the potential of women to thrive and contribute towards strong economies.
Human rights & gender equality
Gender in fisheries
Social development & employment
Worker rights and decent work

Women's economic empowerment in fisheries - In the blue economy of the Pacific Rim

This report provides a baseline analysis of women’s economic empowerment in the fisheries sector in the blue economy of the Indian Ocean rim region. The report focuses on the 22 Member States of the Indian Ocean Rim Association (IORA) and includes both marine and inland fisheries and aquaculture sectors.
Fisheries policy, governance & management
Fisheries management
Human rights & gender equality
Human rights-based approach
Gender in fisheries
Social development & employment
Worker rights and decent work
Social responsibility in seafood
Capacity development

Women in Small-scale Fisheries in Tanzania: Challenges and Opportunities

This video case study explores the challenges that women involved in fisheries activities face on a day to day basis in Tanzania: What successes have they achieved? how can their participation in fisheries be strategically improved? It also explains the strategies in place at local and national levels to counter and improve the situation.
Value chains & post harvest
Value add and processing
Market access
Human rights & gender equality
Gender in fisheries

Unveiling women's roles and inclusion in Mexican small-scale fisheries (SSF)

The contributions of women to fisheries are often invisible, ignored, and unrecognized even though they represent 47% of the global fisheries workforce, especially in pre- and post-production activities. Poor data systems lead to incorrect assumptions about the gender division of labor in fisheries. This causes the role of women in fisheries to be overlooked. To evaluate the contribution of women in the value chain, a participatory methodology was implemented in three small-scale, fisheries in Mexico: California spiny lobster (Panulirus interruptus) fishery from the northern Mexican Pacific, penshell (Atrina maura) fishery from the Gulf of California, and Caribbean spiny lobster (Panulirus argus) fishery from the Mesoamerican Reef region.
Fisheries policy, governance & management
Value chains & post harvest
Value add and processing
Human rights & gender equality
Gender in fisheries
Social development & employment
Fisher and fishworker organizations
Worker rights and decent work
Capacity development

Women's empowerment, collective actions, and sustainable fisheries: lessons from Mexico

Collective action is recognized as a key element to successfully implementing sustainable fisheries. Nevertheless, gender equality, as an essential component in such actions, is often missing. In fisheries, women’s contributions are regularly invisible and remain unrepresented in statistics. In this paper, we examine the current status of women in Mexican fisheries based on governmental reports and programs, as well as five case studies from small-scale fishing communities.
Fisheries policy, governance & management
Co-management
Fisheries management
Human rights & gender equality
Gender in fisheries
Social development & employment
Fisher and fishworker organizations
Leadership
Capacity development

Social protection in small-scale fisheries and aquaculture in Latin America and the Caribbean

Taking into account the economic importance of this sector for small-scale producers, as well as its high degree of vulnerability, the aim of this report is to give an overview of the current state of social protection and challenges facing small-scale fishers and fish farmers in Latin America and the Caribbean. It analyses the social protection needs of this population segment, the main social protection programs in the region, and proposes a roadmap with public policy recommendations to promote adequate social protection.
Fisheries policy, governance & management
Fisheries management
Gender in fisheries
Social development & employment
Fisher and fishworker organizations
Worker rights and decent work

Actioning the Monterey Framework: Stories from Around the World

The Monterey Framework is a collectively agreed-upon definition of socially responsible seafood with input and backing from over two-dozen environmental and human rights organizations and voluntary commitments from an equal number of seafood businesses.
Fisheries policy, governance & management
Fisheries management
Value chains & post harvest
Market access
Human rights & gender equality
Gender in fisheries
Indigenous rights
Social development & employment
Social responsibility in seafood
Food security & nutrition
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