The fishing communities of the Corridor are isolated from one another and are marginalized from the regional economy. They have few opportunities to interact at that scale. Even within a community there is little social structure. The project created a forum for interaction and collaboration for solving problems. To strengthen capacity to participate in this forum and planning process, we have focused on building fisher capacity to represent their communities in an Intercommunity Management Group. Workshops have been offered on communication, negotiation, and other leadership skills. We developed materials, held workshops and organized exchanges with other fishermen to give them a better understanding of the variety of management tools that can be applied to improve fisheries and reduce conflicts. This is key to setting the stage for informed decision-making and adopting new management instruments. For more comprehensive acceptance of the process, all community members should be informed. Through communication programs, messages on billboards, radio addresses, social media and workshops, the program involves the entire community to understand and support the process.
CEDO has a long history of promoting environmental literacy and culture in the region and has tools and resources that aid in this process. CEDO's ability to communicate in a language that fishermen understand facilitates learning. As a local organization, CEDO can adapt its scheduling of meetings and classes to the rhythm of fishing which is somewhat unpredictable due to environmental conditions. Fishermen and communities are eager to learn, but cannot afford to miss income from fishing.
One challenge is transportation. Communities are isolated from public transportation, and CEDO has tried to provide this, but without adequate resources. Solutions could be found if funds were available to purchase vans. One of the most important components for effective capacity building is to speak the language of your audience and to create experiences for interchange, rather than talking at the public. This creates a positive learning environment both for the facilitator as well as the fishermen. Capacity building is also strengthened through direct participation and opportunities to learn while doing, which we promote as another building block in this process.