Urban Amazonians use Fishing as a Strategy for Coping with Food Insecurity

Fishing provides livelihoods and food for millions of people in the Global South yet inland fisheries are under-researched and neglected in food and nutrition policy. This paper goes beyond the rural focus of existing research and examines how urban households may use fishing as a livelihood strategy for coping with food insecurity. Our study in Brazilian Amazonia is based on a random sample of households (n = 798) in four remote riverine towns. We quantitatively examine the inter-connections between fishing and food insecurity, and find that fishing is a widespread coping strategy among disadvantaged, food insecure households. Fisher households tend to be highly dependent on eating fish, and for these households, consuming fish more often is associated with a modest reduction in food insecurity risks. Fishing provides monthly non-monetary income worth ≤ USD54 (equivalent to ∼12% of mean monetary income), potentially reducing food insecurity risks almost as much as the conditional cash transfer Bolsa Família. We estimate that nearly half a million inhabitants of the region’s remote, riverine urban centres are directly dependent on a household member catching fish, a nutritious and culturally preferred food. Consequently, small-scale urban fishers must be recognised in policy debates around food and nutrition security and management of natural resources.

渔业为全球南方（Global South）地区数百万民众提供生计与食物保障，但内陆渔业在粮食与营养政策中却长期被忽视且研究不足。本研究突破既有研究仅聚焦农村的局限，探讨城市家庭如何将捕鱼作为应对粮食不安全的生计策略。我们在巴西亚马逊地区开展的研究，基于对四个偏远沿河城镇共798户家庭（n=798）的随机抽样样本。通过定量分析捕鱼与粮食不安全之间的内在关联，我们发现捕鱼是处境不利、面临粮食不安全的家庭广泛采用的应对策略。渔民家庭往往高度依赖食用鱼类，对于这类家庭而言，更频繁地食用鱼类可适度降低粮食不安全风险。捕鱼可带来每月价值不超过54美元的非货币收入（约相当于家庭平均货币收入的12%），其降低粮食不安全风险的潜力几乎与有条件现金转移支付项目“家庭补助金”（Bolsa Família）相当。我们估算，该地区偏远沿河城镇的近50万居民，直接依靠家庭成员捕鱼获取食物——鱼类是兼具营养与文化偏好的食物。因此，在围绕粮食与营养安全及自然资源管理的政策讨论中，必须纳入对小型城市渔民的考量。