CNH-L: The Potential for Aquaculture in Lake Victoria and Implications for Wild Fisheries and Fish Commodity Markets

2014年，水产养殖（养殖鱼类）超过野生捕捞渔业，成为世界鱼类生产的主要来源。一方面，水产养殖有望填补野生渔业衰退留下的空白，并为世界提供可靠、负担得起的鱼类。另一方面，水产养殖可能会产生负面后果，例如污染、利益分配不公平以及对用于生产鱼饲料的野生鱼类的生态影响。这些权衡在维多利亚湖周围变得越来越明显。面对维多利亚湖野生渔业停滞和沿岸人口激增的情况，水产养殖可能会改善肯尼亚、乌干达和坦桑尼亚的粮食和生计安全。来自三个美国、一个加拿大和三个非洲机构的国际研究小组正在研究维多利亚湖水产养殖的潜力及其对野生渔业、全球和当地鱼类供应以及区域经济发展的影响。研究人员将调查全球对鱼类的需求如何影响当地市场和供应鱼类的渔民，如何使水产养殖的利益分配更加公平，以及在湖泊及其附近建设水产养殖设施如何影响野生渔业的生态和经济。这项工作填补了关于水产养殖和野生鱼类之间联系的关键知识空白，并将增进人们对如何构建发展中国家新兴市场以促进可持续性和公平性的理解。鉴于贫困与政治暴力之间的联系，改善东非的粮食和收入安全将促进全球对美国具有战略重要性的地区的发展。该项目还将建设三个东非研究机构的技术和分析能力，培训学生进行社会生态系统建模，并聘请多元化的国际跨学科研究团队。该项目研究维多利亚湖生态（自然系统）、周边渔业经济（人类系统）之间的动态联系，以及水产养殖在这些系统之间建立的桥梁。在自然子系统中，鱼类丰度的动态受到捕食、竞争和湖泊生产力的调节。在人类子系统中，鱼类需求的动态由当地鱼类消费和全球鱼类出口驱动。自然子系统向人类子系统提供渔获量，人类子系统通过捕捞努力量影响渔业。水产养殖通过增加鱼类产量和响应需求将这些系统联系起来。这项研究将通过将湖泊生物动态与人类社会经济动态联系起来的生态系统核算模型（MIMES）来调查水产养殖对野生渔业和食品商品市场的影响。新的环境、生物和社会经济数据将通过拖网、声学和问卷调查来收集。新的和现有的数据将通过 GIS 进行综合。预测模型（国际期货或 IF）的扩展将研究全球需求动态对我们系统的影响。最后，MIMES 将用于评估维多利亚湖流域的水产养殖增长情景以及鱼类种群动态、粮食安全和收入安全的权衡。

Aquaculture (farmed fish) surpassed wild capture fisheries as the major source of fish production to the world in 2014. On one hand, aquaculture promises to fill the gap left by declining wild fisheries and to provide the world with a reliable, affordable form of fish. On the other hand, aquaculture can have negative consequences such as pollution, inequitable distribution of benefits, and ecological impacts on the wild fish harvested to produce fish feed. These tradeoffs are becoming increasingly evident around Lake Victoria. In the face of stagnating wild fisheries in Lake Victoria and a surging human population around its shores, aquaculture may improve food and livelihood security in Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania. An international team of researchers from three U.S., one Canadian, and three African institutions are investigating the potential for Lake Victoria-based aquaculture and the implications for wild fisheries, global and local supplies of fish, and regional economic development. Researchers will investigate how global demand for fish affects local markets and the fishers who supply them, how the distribution of benefits from aquaculture can be made more equitable, and how building aquaculture facilities in and near lakes affects the ecology and economics of wild fisheries. This work fills a critical gap in knowledge about the links between aquaculture and wild fish, and it will increase understanding of how emerging markets in developing countries can be structured to promote sustainability and equitability. Given links between poverty and political violence, improving food and income security in East Africa will promote development in a part of the globe with strategic importance to the United States. This project will also build technical and analytical capacity at three East African research institutes, train students in socio-ecological systems modeling, and engage a diverse international, interdisciplinary research team.This project investigates the dynamic links between the ecology of Lake Victoria (a natural system), the economy of its surrounding fisheries (a human system), and the bridge between these systems created by aquaculture. Within the natural subsystem, dynamics of fish abundance are regulated by predation, competition, and lake productivity. Within the human subsystem, dynamics of demand for fish are driven by local fish consumption and global fish exports. The natural subsystem supplies fish catch to the human subsystem, and the human subsystem impacts fisheries through fishing effort. Aquaculture links these systems through additional production of fish and response to demand. This research will investigate the effects of aquaculture on wild fisheries and food commodity markets through an ecosystem accounting model (MIMES) that links lake biological dynamics with human socio-economic dynamics. New environmental, biological and socio-economic data will be collected through trawl, acoustic, and questionnaire-based surveys. New and existing data will be synthesized with GIS. The expansion of a forecasting model (International Futures or IFs) will investigate effects of global demand dynamics on our system. Finally, MIMES will be used to assess scenarios of aquaculture growth and tradeoffs in fish population dynamics, food security, and income security in the Lake Victoria basin.