Monitoring recommondations for the Community-based fisheries Mangement Program of Tutuila, American Samoa; For the departmnet of Marien and wildlife Resources Tutuila, American Samoa August 2004

Abstract

Committees from each village have designed and implemented management plans which vary from village to village, but generally include some type of restriction on fishing activity on part or all of the reef fronting their villages. Many of the participating villages have reported anecdotally that they have seen improvement in their resources since the program’s inception, but as of yet, there has been no effort devoted towards scientifically monitoring these areas. As such, a robust, quantitative analysis of the effectiveness of the management efforts has not been possible in any of the participating villages. While it may be too late to obtain useful “baseline” data that shows the state of the marine resources prior to the implementation of the management plans, it is imperative that monitoring commence as soon as possible to allow for future analysis of the trends in the health of the reefs of the villages participating in the CBFMP.