Community Management Associations (CMAs): CMAs are local organizations in charge of designing, implementing, and supervising community fisheries management activities. WARFP supported 12 communities in Senegal and 4 communities on 2 islands in Cabo Verde to develop CMAs. These CMAs are tasked to (1) organize community members and stakeholders, (2) set rules regarding the use and management of the local marine fisheries resources within a specified area or territory, and (3) implement various activities to ensure that the rules are respected and to improve the state of local fisheries and the wellbeing of the community members.

Alternative Livelihoods Support. Fisheries in West Africa face the problem of biological and economic overfishing. Reducing the aggregate fishing effort is known to be the single most effective action to restore fish stocks and reduce excess costs. However, limiting fishing efforts faces practical challenges, especially when fishers rely on fishing activities for their household incomes. In order to encourage fishers and fishing boats to exit the fishing industry and to compensate resulting transitory income losses, WARFP piloted two sets of programs to support alternative livelihoods in Senegal and Cabo Verde.

Revenue Generating Activities (RGAs): Under the first program, each community chose an RGA. For each CMA, at least one RGA was to be financed through WARFP, and the income earned by the RGA was then intended to ensure the functioning of the CMA even after the closure of WARFP. RGAs had to be unrelated to fisheries, but an exception was made to allow for the construction and financing of fishing gear/supplies shops, which were expected to reduce transportation costs faced by fishers and to allow them to use less destructive fishing gear. Other RGAs included cattle farming, poultry farming, and a tourist camp ground.

Microfinance Program. The second activity to support alternative livelihoods in the WARFP community sites was a microfinance program, which targeted individual households starting small-scale enterprises unrelated to fisheries. In Senegal, over 400 projects were financed. The vast majority of projects were labeled as “women entrepreneurship,” and the rest as “fisher reconversion” projects. Most projects were investments in small businesses (for example, clothing, food, cosmetics) and agriculture (for example, vegetable gardening, poultry farming, cattle farming), with a few enterprises in the areas of restaurant and transportation. In Cabo Verde, 23 projects were selected and rated as eligible for microcredit funding.