Progress reports are requested twice a year for a time period specified with the request, normally spring and fall. The reports will summarize progress and findings for the specified period and will include the following sections. A progress report should not exceed 5000 characters:
Carlos G. García-Quijano
Departments of Sociology & Anthropology and Marine Affairs, University of Rhode Island
John J. Poggie
Department of Sociology and Anthropology, University of Rhode Island
Miguel Del Pozo
Department of Social Sciences, University of Puerto Rico-Ponce
David C. Griffith
Department of Anthropology & Institute for Coastal Science and Policy, East Carolina University
Hilda I. Lloréns
Department of Sociology and Anthropology, University of Rhode Island
-Results and findings
This research project was extended through a no-cost extension until December 2018. Although the full field season of 2017 was postponed until 2018, we continued to field interviews and analysis during this time. We also made a brief follow-up field visits to Puerto Rico in January 2018.
We have found multiple linkages between estuarine coastal forest resources and community wellbeing throughout the region. These include multiple coastal activities that span income generating and supplementing, resource sharing, value adding, and capturing for food. Also, we have documented multiple social well-being and beneficence-related practices related to the capture and marketing of coastal forests resources. To these activities we have added documenting the role of coastal resources and associated sharing networks in the aftermath f Hurricane Maria and the economic difficulties associated with Puerto Rico’s debt crisis.
Based on our ethnographic and qualitative fieldwork, we have developed structured questionnaires about coastal forest resource use patterns and dependency in the region. Starting in June 2018, we will be conducting 90 structured interviews with randomlysampled southern coast residents and 30 interviews with coastal forest resource us
-Methods used
-Objectives: (Overall research project’s) Objectives
1) To survey, assess and map, spatially and socially, estuarine forest resource use and dependency along the Southern Coast of Puerto Rico. (80%completed)
2) To describe and quantify the links between estuarine forest resource use and the economic resilience and well-being of study region coastal residents. (50%completed)
3) To assess the role of estuarine forest resources in coastal residents’ household economies and economic histories (to be completed 2nd year)
4) To integrate cultural and socioeconomic data to enhance the information available about the tradeoffs involved in coastal use policy that affects the health and/or access to estuarine resources (to be completed 2nd year)
-Other products
(Include copies of guides, websites, maps and CDs)
-List PI’s supported
Carlos Garcia-Quijano (URI)- (0.72 months, as match)
John Poggie (.40 months, as match)
David Griffith, travel and field research time (as direct cost)
Miguel del Pozo, Field research time (as direct coast)
-List students supported
-Dayanara Soto, M.S. student, UPR-Ponce and Universidad Católica Ponce, dayanara.soto1@upr.edu
- Kevin Torres, B.A. Student, UPR-Ponce, kevin.torres21@upr.edu
- Leonardo Nuñez, B.A. Student, UPR-Ponce, leonardo.nunez@upr.edu
- Hernaliz Vázquez, B.A. Student, UPR-Ponce, Hernaliz.vazquez@upr.edu
- Laura Aponte Díaz, B.S. Student, UPR-Mayaguez, laura.aponte1@upr.edu
Category # of new students # of continuing students # of degrees awarded
Sea Grant
Supported PhD
Sea Grant
Supported MS/MA 1
-List thesis and dissertations from students supported by the project. Sea Grant needs to be acknowledged and include project number. (Include thesis title, student, degree, defense date, copy of “pdf” of thesis when available)
None YET
-List presentations, technical reports and special awards. (Send copies when available)
The Importance of “Pesca de Monte” (Coastal Forest Fisheries) in Southeastern Puerto Rico. Carlos García-Quijano and John Poggie. 76th Annual Meeting of the Society for Applied Anthropology, March 31, 2016, Vancouver, BC, Canada.
Coastal Resource use and Well-Being in Southern Puerto Rico: Cultural models, cultural consonance, and implications for the recovery of coastal communities after Hurricane Maria. Carlos Garcia-Quijano and John Poggie, 78th Annual Meeting of the Society for Applied Anthropology, March 4, 2018, Philadelphia, PA, USA.
Searching for alternative models: What can coastal resource-dependent communities teach us about surviving and thriving in troubled times? Carlos G. García-Quijano and Hilda Lloréns, 116th Annual Meeting of the American Anthropological Association, November 28, 2017, Washington, D.C., USA.
-List references for, books, chapters, and peer reviewed publications, in press, and submittals. Sea Grant needs to be acknowledged and include project number.
García-Quijano, Carlos G., John J. Poggie, and Miguel del Pozo. (2016). “En el Monte También Se Pesca: ‘Pesca de Monte’, ambiente, subsistencia y comunidad en los bosques costeros del sureste de Puerto Rico” (“Pesca de Monte”: Environment, subsistence, and community in the Coastal Forests of Southeastern Puerto Rico). Caribbean Studies 43 (2): 115-144.
-Impact/Accomplishment Statement
Recap: This two-year long research project has field-based data in the Summer of 2016. We have found multiple linkages between estuarine coastal forest resources and community wellbeing throughout the region. These include multiple coastal activities that span income-generating and supplementing, resource sharing, value adding, and capturing for food. Also, we have documented multiple social well-being and beneficence-related practices related to the capture and marketing of coastal forests resources
Response: Between June 2016 and April 2017, we have mapped coastal forest resource use resource in the southern coast of Puerto Rico. We identified the portfolio of coastal forest resources used by coastal communities in the region and their geographical variation along the southern coast, and gathered primary and secondary data about community dependence on this
resources, patterns of use, marketing, and sharing of these resources, and the local ecological knowledge (LEK) of harvesters. We have conducted ethnographic interviews with 35 coastal resource users in the municipalities of Maunabo, Patillas, Arroyo, Guayama, Salinas, Juana Díaz, Ponce, Guayanilla, Guánica, Lajas, and Cabo Rojo.
We have also conducted interviews with 30 people involved in coastal forest resource vending and marketing in the study region, especially owners and managers of restaurants that sell resources such as land crabs, mangrove oysters, clams, and estuarine fish. With these interviews we have gathered data to assess the degree to which the Puerto Rican south coast seafood restaurants depend on local coastal forest resources, the reciprocity patterns related to the use of the resources, and the distribution of economic benefits from local coastal forest resource use
We have worked on analysis of ethnographic data in order to identify and understand local cultural models related to quality of life and well-being (QOL/WB), the different modes of engagement with coastal forest resource use by residents, and the local importance of these coastal resources, specially in the aftermath of Hurricane María and the recent debt crisis in Puerto Rico
In June 2018 we are set to begin our final phase of data collection, implementing a structured questionnaire about coastal forest resource use patterns and dependency in the study region. Starting June 2018, we will be conducting 90 structured interviews with a probability sample of southern coast residents and 30 structured interviews with coastal forest resource users. We expect data collection and analysis to be finished by the end of December 2018 and final project reporting to be done by the end of February 2019.
Dr. Hilda Lloréns, an anthropologist at the University of Rhode Island, has joined our research team as a researcher to collaborate in gathering data about the importance of coastal forest resource-based culinary practices and traditions. She is also substituting as a field data collector in 2018 for Dr. John Poggie, who has been unable to travel to Puerto Rico for health reasons. Dr. Poggie, however, remains involved in instrument development, data analysis, and writing for this project.
Impacts:
During these activities, we have so for:
- trained undergraduate and graduate students in Puerto Rico in ethnographic and social research methods. This includes a formal research methods workshop conducted at the University of Puerto Rico-Ponce for more than 30 students, and faculty as well as hands-on training with 4 undergraduate and 1 graduate students who are participating in data collection activities.
- Collaborated with community organizations and non-governmental organizations, as well as with the Jobos Bay NERR, in sharing data and presenting results about the socioeconomic importance of coastal forest resource use in the region and how to use this data for improved well-being and coastal conservation.