The coastal fisheries sector in Sri Lanka is crucial for food security and nutrition, employment creation, poverty reduction, and foreign exchange earnings. Co-management, a participatory approach involving fishers, the government, and other stakeholders, is widely acknowledged as an effective strategy for sustainable fisheries management. This study investigates how existing co-management platforms in Sri Lanka contribute to addressing key challenges within the coastal fisheries sector. A field survey was conducted with 115 fishermen from six Fisheries Management Committees in two selected Fisheries Management Areas. The study examined issues within the fisheries sector based on four themes of the Small-Scale Fisheries Guidelines adopted by the Food and Agriculture Organization: responsible governance of tenure, sustainable resource management, social development, employment, and decent work, and gender equality. These issues were identified through a previous study conducted by the Sri Lanka Forum of Small-Scale Fisheries in 2019. Both descriptive statistics and parametric hypothesis tests were employed to assess the perceived contribution of co-management platforms. The findings indicate that Sri Lankan coastal fishers generally view co-management mechanisms approvingly. Existing platforms demonstrate a high degree of effectiveness in resolving issues related to the responsible governance of tenure. However, their contribution is moderate in addressing challenges pertaining to sustainable resource management, social development, employment, and decent work. Furthermore, the contribution of co-management platforms is deemed unsatisfactory in ensuring gender equality. The study recommends that government agencies should actively engage in building awareness and educating fishing communities on gender equality and emphasise the importance of sustainable resource management, leading to improved well-being of fishing communities.
Ranatunga et al. (Tue,) studied this question.