Abstract:
Quality fisheries data is critical to sustainable fisheries management. Yet,
gathering quality national fisheries data for fisheries management remains a huge
challenge in many developing countries such as Ghana. This study assessed the
quality of marine fisheries data, the methods used in generating the data, and
how it influences Ghana‘s fishery‘s sustainability. The FAO standard protocol
for national fisheries data collection was used to evaluate the kind of fisheries
data collected and the sampling methods. The results indicated that different data
sets were collected in different districts and regions of the country showing
several discrepancies in the data sets used for developing management plans and
policies. 50 landing sites were sampled out of 292 landing sites in Ghana, instead
of 166 landing sites. For canoes, 290 were sampled out of 11,583 canoes instead
of 372 canoes. Additionally, the results of bioeconomics analysis revealed the
underestimation of catch potentials which has implications on the policy and
management system. The situation eliminates potentially valuable data samples
that could be crucial for the management process, which has an impact on the
precision of the estimated catch and effort. This would thus make it more
difficult to develop relevant regulations for the fisheries industry because the
knowledge gained from this data might result in incorrect conclusions, unwise
policy, and irresponsible fisheries management. It is suggested that, for the
governance and sustainability of the fish stock, fisheries managers, and
policymakers, including all pertinent stakeholders diligently collaborate to strike
a balance between sampling techniques, needs, and the understanding of the data
required. This should also give a balance collection by field and office staff, as
this is essential to producing reliable statistics all year long.
