Thursday 02 October 2008, San José, Costa
Rica
ARGENTINA:
Women Create Food
and Jobs in Wetlands
By Marcela Valente*
SANTA FE, Argentina
(Tierramérica) - Wearing
a cap and a white apron,
Melina Lucero cuts the
heads and tails off fish
caught in the Paraná
River, before skilfully
filleting them. Her
co-workers will process
and package the fish to
sell as traditional,
small-scale fish
preserves at food fairs
along the banks of the
river in Argentina.
Lucero forms part of an
added-value initiative
for small-scale fishing
operations in the
wetlands of the Paraná,
a river that has many
branches in northeastern
Argentina, creating a
series of fragile
ecosystems that are rich
in biodiversity.
The programme, promoted
by the Proteger
(Protect) Foundation,
based in the province of
Santa Fe, trains women
in the region’s fishing
communities.
"The plan consists of
courses in different
fishing communities and,
later, where there is
greater interest as well
as greater possibilities
for development, it
means giving them the
possibility of working
in this area," Julieta
Peteán, wetlands and
fisheries coordinator
for Proteger, told
Tierramérica.
For taking the courses
and producing the fish
products twice a week,
the women receive 250
pesos per month (85
dollars) from a fund
administered by the
Proteger Foundation,
with support from the
Inter-American
Foundation, which
provides grants for
sustainable and
participative projects
in Latin America.
The financial support
will continue until
December. By then,
Proteger expects to have
a negotiation plan ready
that will allow them to
distribute the products
in various markets.
"Those involved will
receive a percentage of
the sales, leading
towards making the
effort self-sustaining,"
added Peteán.
Before getting involved
in the project, some of
the women were
homemakers, while the
men would go to the "ranchada",
a camp the fishermen set
up on one of the islands
of the Paraná, where
they stay two to three
weeks at a time while
they ply the river’s
waters for fish.
But Lucero, whose father
is a fisherman, did work
outside the home a great
deal. The fishermen
"would go to the island
-- about 45 minutes by
boat from Alto Verde, on
one of the branches of
the Paraná -- and I
would go with the
motorboat, to bring them
food, tools and fuel,
and then I’d bring back
the fish to sell," she
tells Tierramérica.
But four years ago, the
catch began to decline.
"Before I would come
back with1,000 or 2,000
kilos, but lately there
were times when I came
back with just 50 kilos
and my head down. Also,
my mother would tell me
it was not a job for a
woman," says Lucero.
Many of the fishermen
began to take jobs as
bricklayers or
farmhands.
Fishing is threatened by
the big hydroelectric
dams on the upper
Paraná, which affect the
breeding grounds of the
fish. Another major
factor is the intensive
exploitation of fish
stocks begun a decade
ago by large companies
that sell the fish to
foreign markets, which
has seen a sharp
increase in the last
five years.
The most-caught fish is
the sábalo, or American
shad (Alosa sapidissima),
a key species in the
food chain because it
feeds the boga, dorado,
surubí, patí and other
fish sought by the
commercial fishing
industry. According to
Proteger’s data, fish
exports from the Paraná
grew from just over
3,000 tons in 1993 to
nearly 40,000 tons in
2004.
With this panorama,
Proteger gave up part of
its headquarters to
launch the pilot
programme for training
women in river
communities. Here, in
Santa Fe, capital of the
province of the same
name, the experience has
advanced further and
various products are
produced, including
smoked fish, pickled
fish and fish paste.
"We prepare escabeche
(pickled fish) and
preserves of the
amarillo, patí, moncholo,
mandubé, boga, armado
and sábalo," says Nelson
Peteán, food engineer in
charge of training and
supervision of
processing in Santa Fe.
"We generate as much as
300 percent added
value," he tells
Tierramérica.
The fishing village of
Puerto Reconquista,
along another arm of the
Paraná in northern Santa
Fe, is working to
replicate the
experience. The women
are seeking a sales
permit from the food
safety authorities,
while production of the
fish preserves takes
place at the home of one
of the members, Mónica
Farías.
Married to a fisherman,
Farías has worked for 12
years as a volunteer at
a community soup kitchen
that serves children of
the local port
community. Now she will
also have a job that
produces income,
alongside her mother,
one of her aunts, and
other women in the
community.
The municipal government
offered a space in the
port where they could
set up a small shop to
process the fish and tan
the skins, which will be
used in crafts. It will
be the first site
certified to operate as
a fish processing plant.
Puerto Reconquista is
located in a
492,000-hectare area of
rivers, lakes and
grasslands, declared an
international wetlands
site in 2001 under the
Ramsar Convention, and
known as Jaaukanigás
("people of water" in a
local indigenous
language).
The Ramsar Convention
was adopted in 1971 in
the Iranian city of that
name with the intention
to conserve biodiversity
and promote the rational
use of wetland
ecosystems.
The Paraná River islands
are home to a number of
species of monkeys,
caiman and birds, and
its waters are estimated
to hold some 300
different fish species.
The Proteger Foundation
training also reached
Puerto Antequera, in the
northern province of
Chaco, where women are
getting ready to produce
the fish preserves. It
is in the heart of
another Ramsar site, the
Humedales Chaco,
declared in 2004,
covering 508,000
hectares.
The initiative to
support artisanal
fishing in wetlands of
the Paraná was one of
the three chosen by the
Ramsar Convention to
provide additional
backing, along with
similar efforts in Nepal
and Thailand, Ramsar
official Natalie
Rizzotti told
Tierramérica.
"The idea is that the
communities themselves
take responsibility for
the resources, which is
why it is important to
have community
participation, education
and added value," said
Rizzotti after visiting
the project sites.
The initiative also has
the support of the Dutch
committee of the World
Conservation Union (IUCN),
an international
conservation body made
up of governments,
non-governmental groups
and experts, which will
present the Paraná
project at the next
global conference, in
Barcelona in October.
(*This story was
originally published by
Latin American
newspapers that are part
of the Tierramérica
network. Tierramérica is
a specialised news
service produced by IPS
with the backing of the
United Nations
Development Programme,
United Nations
Environment Programme
and the World Bank.)
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