walk to the shoreline at night with an offering of tobacco to Father Mangrove They ask for a bountiful hunt and seek permission to enter the mangroves safely Father Mangrove is a revered man of great stature who smokes a pipe and carries a “sambura,” a handmade basket to fill with fish Caranguejeiros who disrespect the spirit by using harsh words or harming mangroves consequentially suffer animal attacks or total disorientation – they can’t find their way home in the nearly-impenetrable mangrove forest Brazil lays claim to 8.5 percent of the world’s mangroves spanning from Amapá in the north to Santa Catarina in the south and covering approximately 13,000 square kilometers It is the second largest area of mangrove forests on the planet Native communities here rely on these mangroves for food most families in the village of Tramataia (population 1,100) in Paraíba State rely on large mangrove crabs (Ucides cordatus) for subsistence and also as their main source of income and crabbing communities in Paraiba State are not immune to the globalization of trade mangrove crab hunting is less traditional and becoming more commercialized explores this transformation – and its impacts – in small shoreline communities like Tramataia Tramataia’s crabs are sold alive in regional markets or traded as processed meat to global chains In a poor community with subpar medical care crabbers are maximizing their income just to make a basic living they rely on intermediaries to bring crabs to market But this commercialization of crabbing incentivizes new harvesting techniques that damage the very mangroves locals depend on passive harvesters and those who adopted a newer environmentally-harmful snaring technique called the “redhina” method “The growing numbers of users of redinha technique is slowly eroding traditional knowledge about the MRE [Maranguape River Estuary] knowledge that involved an elaborate understanding of the mangrove ecosystem as a whole,” Nacimiento wrote in a paper published in the Annals of the Brazilian Academy of Sciences Harvesters dig away at a crab burrow with a machete and insert a small net (redinha) over the mouth The harvester then cuts off a small section of mangrove root and uses it to secure the nylon strings of the snare the harvester will walk his trapline to gather what he’s caught Crabs could die if the snares are not revisited in a few days and caranguejeiros report pollution from the dead crabs and the plastic netting The states of Paraíba and Rio Grande do Norte have prohibited the “redinha” trap The regional ordinances of the Brazilian Institute of the Environment and Natural Resources (IBAMA) also prohibits the capture of females and any small crabs But redhina traps do not discriminate among differently sized crabs published in the Annals of the Brazilian Academy of Sciences the redhina snaring technique is widely popular Eighty five percent of interviewed harvesters reported that they used redhina despite the fact that it’s considered predatory and promotes illegal harvesting Redhina can also lead to the destruction of mangrove habitat as well as the unsustainable overharvest of large mangrove crabs at least one root must be cut for every snare That means an average of 49,680 roots could be cut by a single worker in one year The Mangrove Action Project (MAP) says the world has already lost over half of its original mangrove forest area due to tourism development The world continues to lose one percent of its mangroves or about 150,000 hectares each year the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) estimates that mangroves now cover less than 15 million hectares worldwide “If we can help educate the local crab harvesters on sustainable resource use and conservation the crab harvesters could become our strongest allies protecting the very resources they depend upon for their livelihoods,” said Alfredo Quarto of MAP Protecting the mangrove forests is an obvious preconditioning for ensuring a viable production of crabs Mangrove forests uniquely thrive where ocean and coastal communities collide building singular ecosystems between marine and freshwater biomes Mangroves are teeming with biodiversity between their tangled roots mangroves are home to over 500 species of birds and mud-skipper fish all find refuge in mangroves Mangroves are also known as nature’s shock absorbers They shelter local communities from powerful waves and storms a one hundred foot deep forest can reduce wave height and storm strength by nearly two thirds Mangrove trees are commercially harvested for pulp production trees are being cleared to make room for industry especially resorts and eco-tourism programs Mangrove deforestation leads to salinization of coastal soils and loss of life and property from erosion and extreme weather events “Mangroves are vital for the future of our planet to help combat climate change protect shorelines from rising seas and erosion from hurricanes and tsunamis and provide life and livelihood for millions of coastal people living in the Global South,” said Quarto Sustainable crabbing will protect the mangrove so that the mangrove can most likely necessitates a return to traditional crab harvesting The bracameanto is a traditional subsistence harvest method passed down generationally The catcher puts his arm down a crab’s burrow and pinches the crab by its dorsal carapace between two fingers The catcher does not need to lay traps or follow a predetermined route harvesters can release any female crabs or any crabs less than six centimeters wide Selective crabbing ensures the healthy repopulation of the crab stock so profits can continue well into the future The tapamento is an abridged version of the bracameanto where the crab catcher covers the crab den by pushing sand over the opening with his feet The crabs will eventually dig themselves out of the entrapment but they’re easier to catch after their exertion but it’s also less intrusive to the ecosystem and safer for the harvester Despite socio-economic and environmental benefits crab harvesters are unlikely to return to passive harvesting so long as they remain tied to intermediaries Crab harvesters utilizing the traditional braceamento technique to remove a mangrove crab from its burrow in the Mamanguape River estuary – PB The relationship between the caranguejeiros and the intermediaries is complicated intermediaries provide swift sales and the guaranteed purchase of crab meat allowing harvesters to spend more time in the field and less time peddling their catch Sixty-five percent of harvesters told Nascimento that they did not have the ability to commercialize their catches on their own Intermediaries buy crabs below the legal size (six centimeter- carapace width) and use them mostly for processed meat Women in Tramataia boil the smaller crabs in large aluminum cauldrons for thirty minutes before dismembering the crab and extracting the meat Intermediaries take the meat and store it in freezers They often report the meat contains traces of spotted eagle ray (Aetobatus narinari) and nurse shark (Ginglymostoma cirratum) Ray and shark meat generally sells for much less on the open market than crab By padding the crab catch with ray and shark meat harvesters meet the high quotas set by intermediaries and sell lower quality meat for a higher price this “fake” crab meat can account for more than half the meat sold commercially Meat from the crab’s ventral region is sold for US $5.76/kg and meat from the claw is more valuable The bar and restaurant owners in the city of João Pessoa All five intermediaries interviewed by Nascimento said they provide informal loans to the harvesters without any written documents Loans mostly went towards housing expenses for caranguejeiros in exchange for exclusive rights to all of the harvester’s crabs But interviewed caranguejeiros reported to Nascimento that they “felt exploited by the low prices offered to them for their hard labors.” This resentment was not openly expressed as most intermediaries and harvesters become friends and godparents to one another’s sons and daughters The mangrove crab is included in the national list of Overexploited or Threatened Species of Exploitation and there is a proposed management plan to sustain a healthy crab population has historically done a poor job of communicating regulations to indigenous communities “The regulation of crab capture is the responsibility of the IBAMA but a conservation oriented regulatory framework currently in effect is based on prohibitive rules that were largely designed without the participation of the crab collectors themselves.” The crab scavengers of the village Tramataia also have poor social standing which exacerbates their socioeconomic vulnerability Nascimento recommends both the harvesters and the women who process crab meat should organize themselves into cooperatives in order to market their harvests and free themselves from intermediaries “If there is interest from the intermediaries they could also be part of the same cooperatives or associations,” he wrote in an email “The crab harvesters of Tramataia village constitute a group with socioeconomic vulnerability and poor social organization there must be a connection between harvesters and partners (government which may be formed by the scientists and the management of the Conservation Unit (CU) in which the community is inserted.” The organization of cooperatives might even aggregate the value of crabs themselves and ultimately help caranguejeiros better control crab supply to dictate local market prices A cooperative would also incentivize harvesters to record the size and amount of their catch so they could monitor crab populations and ensure the health of the mangrove ecosystem This would require building business relationships with nonprofits and private institutions to help them store and transport the crab Partnerships with research organizations and even government institutions could help with conservation projects It’s also possible to make and sell fertilizer from the discarded crab there are other examples of such cooperatives that are improving the quality of life of crab collectors in Brazil which enhances the sustainable commercialization of the crab in the region of the Delta of the river Parnaíba Tramataia could benefit from a similar model Locals could potentially generate income while simultaneously protecting the mangrove against illegal cutting And Father Mangrove could once again smoke his pipe in peace Nascimento, Douglas M. et al. (2016). Commercial relationships between intermediaries and harvesters of the mangrove crab Ucides cordatus (Linnaeus, 1763) in the Mamanguape River estuary, Brazil, and their socio-ecological implications. Ecological Economics,131(2017), 44-51. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ecolecon.2016.08.017 The replacement of traditional capture techniques of caranguejo-uçá crabs (Ucides cordatus) by the redinha (little-net technique) in the Mamanguape River Estuary Annals of the Brazilian Academy of Sciences The “fortress conservation” model is under pressure in East Africa as protected areas become battlegrounds over history and global efforts to halt biodiversity loss Mongabay’s Special Issue goes beyond the region’s world-renowned safaris to examine how rural communities and governments are reckoning with conservation’s colonial origins and trying to forge a path forward […]