Fisher poverty, value chain equity, and resilience: The case of the Indonesian Blue Swimming Crab and the Peruvian Mahi-Mahi

Many marine fishery supply chains are becoming increasingly global and export oriented. Simultaneously, academic discussions around fisheries and poverty have often construed fishers as being among the poorest and most marginalised people in society. However, how value accrues along these supply chains, and how that affects fisher wellbeing, remains understudied. If fishers are indeed impoverished and relevant stakeholders wish to address the causes of impoverishment, then understanding how the value of a fish accrues along a value chain is essential. This research seeks to more clearly understand the existence, nature, and extent of fisher poverty through case studies of the Peruvian Mahi-Mahi and the Indonesian Blue Swimming Crab fisheries. It examines how value accrues along export-oriented fishery supply chains in country of origin and the prevalence of underearning at the fisher level. The value accrued at each domestic value chain step (fishers, middlemen/aggregators, processors) is estimated and used to calculate the level of underearning experienced by fishers within the value chains. Underearning is understood here as falling below a living income threshold, rooted in a rights-based approach to human rights. It is found that while fishers earn a significant percentage of the value of a fish that accrues in the country of origin, differences in number of actors per value chain step and labour intensity per kg of product handled mean that fishers still typically earn significantly less than other value chain groups. Underearning is found to be present in both value chains, with 69 % of Blue Swimming Crab fishers and 38 % of Mahi-Mahi fishers earning less than the rural living income. The outcomes of the research indicate that while fishers, particularly in export-oriented fisheries, are not the poorest of the poor, they still face significant challenges to their well-being and the stability of their livelihoods. It is recommended that future research incorporate more multi-faceted approaches to poverty and well-being in their analysis.