Abstract

The spiny lobster fishery (Panulirus argus) develops widely in the Venezuelan Caribbean, locating most of its production in the Los Roques Archipelago National Park. As in other Caribbean artisanal fisheries, this resource has been evaluated in the locality using conventional methods, some of which warn about an eminent overexploitation, while others only reflect seasonal variations on the landing reports, without major concern. Under these criteria of uncertainty, the local authorities manage the resource establishing limits on their captures; restrictions that result in conflicts with the fishermen whom consider were not included when decisions were taken. For it, the present study is orientated to evaluate the state of the resource in the archipelago, using the “Program of Participative Evaluation of Fishing Resources (ParFish)”, which is based in promoting active connection of the parts involved in the fishery, taking advantage of traditional knowledge, stimulating cooperation, to incentive co-responsibility in the management of resource and seeking to improve the indicators of fishing performance. Using this methodology, 109 surveys were applied during the season 2008-2009, concluding that the fishing effort exceeded the limits recommended by the program, which avoid the collapse of the fishery. The chance for fishing overexploitation was estimated on 65%, which agree with the opinion of 76% of fishermen, which consider that the resource is being overfished, and recommends to reduce the season and to control the fishing effort.

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