IMPROVING THE LIVELIHOODS OF ARTISANAL FISHERY FAMILIES IN MOZAMBIQUE
In 2011 the OPEC Fund approved a US$13.5 million loan for improving the livelihoods of fishing families in Mozambique. Disbursements started in 2013 and completed in 2020. The
centers and freezers and coolers for ice), by supporting activities to improve transport and sales (such as building fish market facilities), and by building or restoring 518 km of roads for better access to markets. The project also increased finan- cial services available to artisanal fishing communities, provided ca- pacity-building activities to govern- ment institutions, and trained target households on balanced cooking and eating habits to reduce malnu- trition. In total, the project reached around 56,000 people (3,680 of which women) in the fishing value chain, providing training, improved equipment, and/or financial services. The 2020 completion report estimated that the project con- tributed to a 12 percent increase in the share of high-val- ue fish catch and to an almost 90 percent increase in total artisanal fishing production in the targeted areas. House- holds that had received support experienced on average a 10 percent increase in income. Household possession of means of transport such as motor vehicles or motor boats roughly doubled. Possession rates of TVs, fridges/freezers and in-house energy sources more than doubled, and the percentage of households reporting always being able to purchase food increased from 25 percent to 33.6 percent, while the share of households finding it sometimes difficult to obtain food declined from 52.18 percent to 43.7 percent.
project was co-financed with IFAD, the European Union and the gov- ernment of Mozambique.
An estimated 334,000 people de- pend directly or indirectly on arti- sanal fishing in Mozambique. Most fishing communities are small, iso- lated, poor and semi-subsistence in nature. Apart from the uncertain
availability of fish resources, the livelihoods of families active in the fishing value chain were held back by rudimentary fishing equipment, high post-harvest losses due to poor fa- cilities and handling, a lack of ice and cooling equipment, limited access to financial services, poorly functioning mar- kets, high illiteracy rates and poor roads connecting fishing communities to potential markets. The project aimed at improving incomes and livelihoods of poor households involved in artisanal fisheries in target areas by providing training on fishing/fish handling techniques and building boats (to allow fishermen to access more re- source-rich open sea fishing areas), by promoting the use of ice to conserve fish (enabled by the construction of 185km of new electricity lines, the connection of 2,845 new users, the provision of 8 photovoltaic systems to island fishing
45
Powered by FlippingBook