At first light along Ghana’s Cape Three Points coastline in the Western Region, fishermen push wooden canoes into waters that have sustained generations of coastal families. But those waters are becoming increasingly difficult to depend on.
Their survival depends, in part, on reforms promised under Ghana’s Marine Fisheries Management Plan (MFMP) 2022–2026, designed to reverse the ecological and socio-economic decline of the country’s marine fisheries.
As the five-year implementation period draws to a close, a troubling question hangs over the coastline: how much of that promise has actually reached the sea?
At Akwidaa, Francis Dadzie, a fisherman with more than two decades of experience, says crews now spend more than GH¢800 on fuel each time they launch their canoes, only to return with empty nets or tiny juvenile fish that should have been left to mature.
He also complains that industrial trawlers light up the ocean horizon at night, taking large quantities of fish while small-scale fishermen return home empty-handed. In Lower Dixcove, Victoria Bolor spent more than 20 years buying, smoking and selling fish. Today, she sells roasted plantains by the roadside.
She says she stopped buying fish because there is simply not enough catch coming in as there used to be. For her, a trade that sustained her for decades has effectively disappeared.
The consequences are increasingly visible in declining catches, shrinking incomes and growing uncertainty along Ghana’s fishing communities.
Promises on paper
The Marine Fisheries Management Plan introduced interventions intended to rebuild depleted fish stocks, including annual closed fishing seasons, a national network of Marine Protected Areas (MPAs), minimum net mesh sizes, a ban on monofilament nets, stronger action against Illegal, Unreported and Unregulated (IUU) fishing, and registration and capacity capping of the artisanal canoe fleet.
Of five potential sanctuary sites initially identified, only the Greater Cape Three Points Marine Protected Area has so far been formally established. Maame Esi Bordah Quayson, Director of the Fisheries Commission, said at a recent Environmental Journalism Network workshop that implementation had been guided by a Technical Advisory Committee.
The protected area covers roughly 700 square kilometres and 60 kilometres of coastline, encompassing 21 communities. Yet it accounts for only about two per cent of Ghana’s territorial waters, while communities remain uncertain about its boundaries, restrictions and alternative livelihoods.
Mr Kofi Cosmos, Deputy Chief Fisherman at Akwidaa, says community support will depend on clarity and practical assistance. Fishers, he argues, cannot be expected to respect restrictions on traditional fishing grounds without knowing how their families will survive when those grounds are closed.
Protection without the tools
Nicholas Adre Mensah, a member of the local Marine Protected Area monitoring team, says surveillance units lack basic equipment, including patrol craft and fuel. Without the means to patrol the waters, he says, enforcing boundaries becomes extremely difficult.
Kofi Agbogah, Executive Director of Hen Mpoano, says drawing boundaries on a map is only the first step. True ecological recovery, he argues, requires sustained offshore monitoring, consistent enforcement, community compliance and viable alternative livelihoods.
The closed-season question
Annual closed fishing seasons have become part of Ghana’s fisheries management calendar, but their conservation impact remains contested. One challenge is the continued fishing by more than 14,000 canoes while vulnerable stocks are supposed to recover.
The pressure is particularly evident in the decline of small pelagic fish, an important source of affordable protein for low-income households. Data from the Fisheries Scientific and Survey Division shows annual sardinella catches have fallen from peaks above 100,000 metric tonnes in the 1990s to less than 15,000 metric tonnes in recent years.
Kwesi Egyir, a canoe owner at Lower Dixcove, blames illegal light-attraction fishing and fine-mesh nets for destroying local livelihoods. His colleague, Kweku Ansah, says closing the sea for one month changes little if destructive fishing practices continue unchecked.
Laws without enforcement
Ghana has regulations prohibiting monofilament nets and prescribing minimum mesh sizes to allow juvenile fish to escape and mature. Yet illegal gear remains widely used at major landing centres, including Tema and Sekondi.
More than 12,000 motorised wooden canoes operate from 279 landing sites across 187 communities, harvesting roughly 70 per cent of Ghana’s marine catch.
The industrial fleet consists of about 45 licensed trawlers operating mainly from Tema and Takoradi.
To protect small-scale fishers, recent regulatory changes expanded the Exclusive Zone for Artisanal Fishers from six to 12 nautical miles offshore.
Yet Cosmos and other fishermen along Cape Three Points say industrial trawlers continue to enter these protected coastal waters, often under cover of darkness.That raises questions about whether state agencies are effectively tracking incursions through satellite-based Vessel Monitoring Systems, how many violations have resulted in sanctions and whether penalties are strong enough to deter repeat offences.
The cost of a depleted sea
Official figures from the Ministry of Fisheries and Aquaculture Development (MoFAD) and the Ghana Statistical Service show fisheries contribute between one and 1.5 per cent directly to Ghana’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP), rising to roughly 4.5 per cent when the wider value chain is included.
Research published in Frontiers in Marine Science estimates that IUU fishing costs West Africa between US$1.95 billion and US$2.3 billion annually in lost revenues and resource rents. At Achonwa, Auntie Efua Attaa, a fishmonger, says 10 processors can be forced to compete for just two small basins of fish, with some returning home without enough income to cover their costs.
International pressure
Ghana’s struggle with illegal fishing has also attracted international trade pressure. In 2021, the European Union issued Ghana a second yellow card over deficiencies in controlling illegal fishing, after previously issuing and later lifting a yellow card between 2013 and 2015.
Failure to address enforcement weaknesses could lead to further sanctions affecting Ghana’s seafood exports to the European market. Agbogah says the recurrence of the warning points to deeper weaknesses in fisheries governance.
Today, a population of more than 30 million depends on an over-capitalised fleet of about 12,000 canoes exploiting increasingly depleted resources, while financing for offshore patrols remains constrained.
What has changed?
Measured against the ambitions of the Marine Fisheries Management Plan, implementation presents a mixed picture. There has been progress in policy development, fleet registration and annual closed fishing seasons. But major gaps remain.
The national network of Marine Protected Areas is incomplete. Illegal fishing continues. Fine-mesh nets remain in use. And fishermen continue to report industrial incursions into areas reserved for artisanal fishing.
“A management plan cannot be judged by drafted commitments or workshops, but by whether fish stocks recover and families can sustain themselves,” Cosmos says in Twi.
Scientists estimate that strict enforcement could restore small pelagic stocks within five to 10 years, strengthening food security. But restoration will require enforcement on the water, effective monitoring, deterrent penalties and viable alternatives for affected communities.
Professor F. K. E. Nunoo of the University of Ghana says community co-management cannot mean transferring responsibilities to communities without giving them the resources, legal authority and information required to perform them effectively.
The people left waiting
Back at Akwidaa, Francis Dadzie mends his nets in the midday heat. At Achonwa, women sit beside cold-smoking trays, waiting for fish that may never arrive. And in Lower Dixcove, Victoria Bolor turns plantains over charcoal, having left behind the fish-processing trade that sustained her for more than two decades.
For them, the success of Ghana’s fisheries strategy will be measured in simpler terms than policy documents and management plans: whether the canoes return with fish, whether processors have enough to smoke and sell, and whether coastal families can once again depend on the sea for their livelihoods.
The challenge facing Ghana is not simply to produce another fisheries policy, but to make the existing rules work where they matter most — on the water and along the landing beaches.
BY KINGSLEY E HOPE
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