A social wellbeing approach to the gendered impacts of fisheries transition in Gujarat, India

Abstract

In this paper, we use the analytical lens of social wellbeing to interpret the history of livelihood change in the coastal village of Saiyad Rajpara in Gujarat over the past 70 years. We describe a broad narrative of transition from food scarcity to food security brought about by the introduction and intensification of bag net fishing in the village. This form of fishing has largely displaced the previous economic basis for livelihoods of uncertain daily wage labour. In a pattern common along the coast, an economy offering at best subsistence has shifted to one that is market-oriented, and which generates considerable surplus. We use the social wellbeing perspective to take stock of and order the complex effects of this transition. While the intensification of small-scale fishing in Saiyad Rajpara resulted in a general and marked material improvement in the lives of the residents of the village, the social relational benefits and subjective experience of change have been more mixed, particularly along lines of gender. A social wellbeing perspective offers an approach to fisheries governance that is more inclusive and sensitive to local experience.