Fishery policy and job satisfaction in three southeast Asian fisheries

Reduction of fishing effort by providing alternative employment for fishers is a frequently mentioned policy option. This option is based on assumptions that fishing is a dirty, hard, undesirable occupation, hence employment of last resort and that fishers are amongst the poorest of the poor; and that the poor care little about the type of job they have as long as they make enough to live. This paper first examines the quality of evidence supporting these assertions. It then analyses primary data concerning aspects of job satisfaction among small-scale fishers in the Philippines, Indonesia and Vietnam. The analyses indicate that most fishers would not leave fishing for an alternative occupation, citing income as well as non-income factors for resisting the change. This leads to the conclusion that the above assumptions are not consistent with either the literature or the current analysis. Hence, fishery policy based on these assumptions or the uninformed sponsorship of alternative employment is likely to fail.