CHAPTER II

REVIEW OF RELATED LITERATURE

Local Literature

Small-scale fisheries (SSFs) are important contributors to the global

seafood system and crucial components of food and nutrition systems. Nearly

half of the world’s seafood, the most traded food commodity (Asche et al. 2015),

is produced by SSFs (World Bank 2012) and has the potential to address global

undernourishment and food security issues (Golden et al. 2016; Thilsted et

al. 2016; Hicks et al. 2019).However, Coronavirus was declared a worldwide

pandemic by the World Health Organization in the year 2020 (WHO, 2020).

Countries globally have taken several preventive actions to mitigate and flatten

the curve of hospitalization and death by implementing measures such as travel

bans, home confinement, social distancing, local lockdowns, and business

closure methods were implemented by governments all over the world (Jomitol et

al., 2020; UN, 2020). The said pandemic has drawn several difficulties such as

health threat and economic crises, leading into a progressive incidence of famine

and shortage of food especially on both agriculture and the fisheries (Sumner et

al., 2020). The countries in Southeast Asian nations were also affected by the

pandemic slowly taking over each country which also touches the Philippines

(Ferrer et al., 2021). With the numerous populations of more than 100 million and

more than 7,100 islands, the Philippines is considered rich in natural resources

including the sea resources leading us as the major fishing nation with 1.6 million

Filipino fishers; where an estimated 957,551 fishers use traditional hooks and
lines, and gillnets for their daily fishing (BFAR, 2015). The small-scale or

municipal fisheries in the Philippines play a critical role in the livelihoods and food

security of coastal communities and the nation (Perez et al., 2012). The

enormous implications of COVID-19 lockdown in small-scale fisheries (SSF)

have become evident, manifestations include, closing down of fishing operations,

closed market stalls affecting food security (Béné et al., 2015; Gregorio and

Ancog, 2020; Ferrer et al., 2021). Prior pandemics show that lockdowns and

panic not only affect human activities and economic growth but it also affects

fisheries supply chains, tourism, and agricultural activities that induces hunger

and malnutrition as well as psychological impacts (Bermejo, 2004; Cullen et al.,

2020; Sunny et al., 2021).

In the mid-March 2020, Enhanced Community Quarantine (ECQ) started as a

preventive measure to the COVID-19 pandemic. The ECQ meant “stay at home”

as mobility and transportation (air, water, and land) were restricted (Ferrer et al.,

2021). It affects people’s daily activity patterns or regular movements and habits

from jogging, walking to dining in restaurants, which were previously thought

normal or usual (Simunek et al., 2021). In the fisheries, movement restrictions

significantly affected the fishers and also affected fish supply and demand,

including fish distribution, labor and production of fish (Love et al., 2020; Belton

et al., 2021). It is estimated that 10% of the global population depends on SSF

for their livelihood, resulting in rising food insecurity among fishing communities

(Sunny et al., 2021). In Sabah, Malaysia, researchers found that mobility control
procedures negatively affected fish trading of small-scale fishers (Jomitol et al.,

2020).

This pandemic negatively changes every aspect of life, including fishers

and their families especially in their livelihoof (Bennett et al., 2020; Demirci et al.,

2020). During the pandemic, the price of fish decreased because of the

restrictions making it more difficult for fishing families to conduct their daily

activities (Hidayati et al., 2021). Despite the health threat of going outside, most

of them still go into fishing every day and disregard its possible effect on their

health and fishing costs (Kaewnuratchadasorn et al., 2020). This is because they

have no alternative livelihood (Avtar et al., 2021).

Foreign Literature

COVID-19 pandemic has been identified as an economic threat to both

developed and developing economies, which is even more in underdeveloped

economies (Erokhin and Gao, 2020; Hossain et al., 2021). It is because of its

impacts on livelihood, employment, buying and consumption behavior, food and

nutritional security. Empirical evidences have shown that it has caused decline in

major macro-economic indicators across the globe because of the measures

undertaken controlling spread of the virus (Erokhin and Gao, 2020; White et al.,

2021; Shah et al., 2020 and Azra et al., 2021; Béné et al., 2021).
 Fisheries and aquaculture are no exception and thus, has been greatly

affected by the pandemic because of its interconnectedness with other sectors of

the economy. However, the stability of the sector is crucial to the global food and

nutritional security, and livelihood of millions, mostly in developing countries

where the sector plays an important role contributing to employment, economic

empowerment, and improving diet quality of the vulnerable people. Globally

fisheries and aquaculture has achieved all time highest production (179 million

tonnes) before pandemic i.e., in 2018 with major contribution from aquaculture

(FAO, 2021). As a result, fish intake as a primary source of protein among the

poorest people has increased dramatically in recent decades (FAO, 2021).

However, COVID-19 pandemic has brought about real sufferings for the people

engaged in fish supply chain ranging from fishing or aquaculture production to

wholesale or retailing. It is because each of the fish supply chain activities is

critical to the success of the chain and is susceptible being disrupted by the

COVID-19 containment measures undertaken affecting the livelihoods and food

nutrition. Among the agricultural sub-sector, the pandemic hurts the fisheries

sector most through shifting consumers' demand, border restrictions,

transportation problems, which, in turn, devastates the income and livelihood of

fish farmers, fishers, and all the people engaged in the aquaculture and fisheries

sector (FAO, 2020).

Nevertheless, among all actors, fish farmers were the most affected by the

COVID-19 preventive measures since they are unable to trade their large
volumes of fish due to a lack of traders from distant markets, the closure

of arat (local auction site), transit movement restrictions, and other factors.

Consequently, they had to stock mature fish for a longer length of time and

subsequently increase feed cost and other production costs (FAO, 2021). On the

other hand, fishers are unable to roam to capture fish during the COVID-19

enforced movement restriction, resulting in a severe loss of their income.

Besides, fishers had almost nothing to do during the ban period, making them

more vulnerable to the COVID-19 pandemic due to a lack of alternative sources

of income (Sunny et al., 2021). The pandemic further limited the fish farmers, and

fishers' access to credit, commercial inputs and markets (Sunny et al., 2021).

Despite the fact that the COVID-19 did not directly impair aquaculture and

fisheries production, the task of guaranteeing uninterrupted aquatic food

production and supply, fair prices for products, and healthy food for all have been

elevated as a result of the global pandemic (Sunny et al., 2021). Several pieces

of research have been conducted around the world to quantify the influence of

COVID-19 on aquaculture and fisheries (Waiho et al., 2020; van Senten et al.,

2020; Manlosa et al., 2021; Azra et al., 2021; Jamwal and Phulia, 2021; van

Senten et al., 2021; Love et al., 2021), and the summary of the previous findings

are presented in Table A1. According to these research, the pandemic increased

transportation expenses, production costs, food inflation, and reduced demand

for fish and fisheries products in many developing nations.

Fish farming has grown dramatically in Bangladesh in recent decades because of

the commercialization of aquaculture farms (Khan et al., 2018; Mitra et al.,

2020; Mitra et al., 2019). Around 17 million people rely on the fishing, farming,

fish handling, and processing industries for livelihood (BFTI, 2016). With such a

large labor force involvement and contribution to economy, the COVID-19's

effects on the fisheries and aquaculture sectors of Bangladesh is undeniable.

Studies on impact of COVID 19 on aquaculture and fisheries in Bangladesh

pointed that, the pandemic has negatively influenced livelihood assets and

activities of those who rely on fishing while a positive effect has been on the

ecosystem and the wild fish stock (Islam et al., 2021). Furthermore, reduced

income, difficulties in starting a new production season, inputs collection, labor

shortages, transportation abstraction, low consumer demand, and creditor's

pressure were identified as the main drivers affecting aquaculture (Hoque et al.,

2021; Sunny et al., 2021; Hasan et al., 2021).

Although a few empirical studies conducted in Bangladesh, there is scarce

information on (i) changes in capture and culture fish prices due to pandemic; (ii)

changes in fisheries-related activities and income of fish farmers, fishers, and fish

traders due to COVID-19; (iii) changes in fish supply chain and value chain

activates because of the pandemic; (iv) challenges faced by the fishers, fish

farmers, and traders due to COVID-19 in input and output market; and (v)

strategies followed to overcome the challenges.