Climate Change and Fishery Sustainability in Lake Victoria

Abstract

The fisheries of Lake Victoria have recently undergone rapid ecological and social change. Loss of diversity in terms of species richness and economic opportunity has increased the system’s vulnerability to additional economic, ecological, and social stressors predicted with future climate change. This paper discusses the fisheries of Lake Victoria as a complex adaptive social-ecological system and summarises the recent literature on the impacts of climate change on the Lake Victoria Basin. Possibilities for reducing vulnerability and enhancing adaptive capacity in the basin are discussed. The paper concludes that the Lake Victoria Fisheries Organization is uniquely able to address present and future sustainability challenges, but that a  re-examination of the sustainability goals of fishery may be appropriate.

Key words: Social-ecological systems, resilience, adaptive capacity, vulnerability, localisation

*Paper presented to the Lake Victoria Stakeholder’s Conference, Kampala, 27-30 October 2008