The Carewater INREM Foundation study tries to understand and analyze the institutional arrangement for leasing of water bodies for culture fishery and changes that have occurred over the past 50 years in Gujarat.

The interactions-conflicts and cooperation between irrigators and fisher folk in inland water bodies has been analyzed. The impact of these on productivity, equity, livelihoods, employment, food security, nutrition of vulnerable section including women in rural areas is assessed.

The rise of culture fishery has simultaneously strengthened complementarities as well as competition between irrigation and inland fishery water bodies. The study attempts to understand if the strongly bonded institutional environment (at the macro-level) and institutional arrangements (at the local or the micro level) are enabling these institutions to work together by solving their inherent conflicts. Particularly so, when these multipurpose water bodies are used by different stakeholders in the environment of common property regime (CPR).

The study investigates the role of institutions that nurture the development of fisheries as a profitable economic endeavor through a ‘real deal’ in rural environment, as also the role of governance of such institutions for long-term growth and sustainability. 

Case studies and exhaustive interviews are undertaken spread over three broad categories of common property regime and within formal & informal institutions. The cases from three broad categories, co-operative, private contractors and privately owned have been discussed in the perspective of New Institutional Economics. The particular cases include - 

• Reservoirs used by irrigators and fisheries under cooperative management.
• Village ponds or gam-talavs owned by panchayats, but leased out through Fish Farmers Development Agency (FFDA) to private contractors.
• Private fishponds dug in the private lands of fish farmers or by other entrepreneurs.

Transaction costs and pay-offs have been established using the information gathered during the field-visits.

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