Fishing impact and food security - Gender differences in finfisheries across Pacific Island countries and cultural groups

Summary and conclusions While there is no doubt that fishing and its related activities are extremely important for men and women in coastal areas of PICTs (Lambeth 2000; Wil-liams et al. 2002; Bennett 2005), it is uncertain what percentage of the estimated subsistence catch (about 70–80% of the total inshore catch) is accounted for by fisherwomen (Lambeth et al. 2002). Our results provide insight into quantitative catch rates of fish-erwomen across the region, and as compared by cultural groups. Earlier studies that suggested that women’s contributions are substantive (Avalos 1995; Passfield 2001; Rawlinson et al. 1985) are confirmed, particularly for Melanesian communities. However, our results also indicate that fishermen are mainly responsible for the total annual catch of a commu-nity, most of which is sold on the local market to people not belonging to the fishermen’s community. Thus, our results highlight the importance of target-ing subsistence and commercial artisanal fishers, dif-ferences in gender contributions to both of these, and differences between cultural groups.Our results also reveal that in addition to major dif-ferences that exist between fishermen’s and fisher-woman’s finfisheries by impact (measured as total annual catch), the fishing done by both gender groups varies substantially by investment (meas-ured in total hours spent fishing), fishing strategy (measured in number of months fished during the year, frequency and duration of fishing trips, use of boat transport for fishing, timing of fishing trips), productivity (measured as average annual catch) and efficiency (measured as CPUE, i.e. kg of catch per hour of fishing trip). The fact that men spent sig-nificantly more time fishing than women is a func-tion of a higher number of months fished throughout