Subsistence fisheries in lower order streams: notes on species preference, fishing methods, catch composition, yield and dietary importance of fish by Benoit M.F. Mys and Paul Van Zwieten

Above title: Papua New Guinea

A report prepared for project PNG/85/001 Sepik River fish stock enhancement project One of the aims of the Sepik River Fish Stock Enhancement Project is to find out the potential of fish stocking into the Sepik-Ramu river system. To achieve this aim research is done that is primarily biological and ecological in nature. However, the aim of stocking is to improve the fishery resources available to the people living in the region. Coates (1985) has pointed out that the yield from the floodplain area is low compared to other floodplain areas in the world. He attributed these low y ields to the impoverished fish fauna of the Sepik basin. Although fishing is not a major activity of the people living in the hills and mountains of the Sepik-Ramu catchment, it is nevertheless generally assumed that fish forms a considerable part of their protein diet, as other protein sources are (equally) scarce. One of the aims of the fisheries survey in this region above the main channel and its system of floodplains, lakes and backswamps done by Benoit Mys was to find out how important fis h is in the diet of these people, and what effort they put into fishing.