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Prof Moenieba Isaacs

Academic Coordinator and Professor

+27-(0)21-959-3721
misaacs@plaas.org.za

Biography

Professor Moenieba Isaacs is the Academic Coordinator and senior researcher at the Institute for Poverty, Land and Agrarian Studies (PLAAS) at the University of Western Cape. Her research areas focus is on understanding the social and political processes of blue justice for small-scale fishers, gender, fish as part of the food system, fisheries reform, Marine Protected Areas, blue economy and biodiversity conservation in South Africa and southern Africa. She has worked extensively with fishing communities, CBOs and NGOs in Southern Africa and internationally to find policy solutions to the problems to the social differentiation in fishing communities. She is an engaged and reflective scholar and always working on finding creative ways to engage with social processes, decision making and policymaking in the context of diverse civil society interests.

Professor Isaacs is the lead  PI on creating systemic redesign of the wet and dry conservation sector in Southern Africa called Living Landscapes in Action. Country coordinator for Small-scale fisheries (SSF) project on Vulnerability to Viability (V2V). She is a team member of the transformative social innovations in the governance of small-scale fisheries in the Indian ocean region. She was co-PI on African food systems and Covid-19 PLAAS – one-year action-oriented project entitled ‘The Impacts of Covid-19 Responses on the Political Economy of African Food Systems’.

Professor Isaacs formed part of the UN Committee on Food Security’s High Level Panel of Experts on Food Security and Nutrition (HLPE) on the Role of Sustainable Fisheries and Aquaculture for Food Security and Nutrition 2014. She was part of the expert team organised by United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) to unpack the notion of fisheries crime in February 2016 and is a director of the research group PescaDolus developing frameworks for fisheries crime internationally. In 2016, she worked with a team to review the implementation of the Voluntary Guidelines on the Governance of Tenure in Land, Fisheries, Forestry and Indigenous Communities for the Civil Society Mechanism (CSM). In 2024, she formed part of Scientific Advisory Committee for the World Wildlife Crime Report 2024.

Research Focus

Small-scale fisheries management and rights, Individual Transfer Quotas (ITQs)

Qualifications

  • PhD on the implementation of new fisheries policies in four South African fishing communities, University of the Western Cape, 2004
  • MPhil, University of the Western Cape

Selected Publications

International Peer Reviewed Journals

Isaacs, M. and Witbooi, E. 2019. Fisheries crime, human rights and small-scale fisheries in South Africa: A case of bigger fish to fry. Marine Policy, 105, pp.158-168.  DOI: 10.1016/j.marpol.2018.12.023

Isaacs, M. 2016. The humble sardine (small pelagics) ‒ fish as food or fodder. Agriculture and Food Security. DOI: 10.1186/s40066-016-0073-5

Isaacs, M. 2015. Multi-stakeholder process of co-designing small-scale fisheries policy in South Africa. Special Issue: Global change, human-ocean interactions and ways forward. 15(7) ISSN 1436-3798.Reg Environ Change. DOI 10.1007/s10113-015-0874-2

 

International Peer Reviewed Book Chapters

Isaacs M. (2018) Climate variability, overfishing and transformation in the small pelagics sector in South Africa. For chapter in volume ‘Responses of marine systems to environmental change’, eds Patrice Guillotreau, Alida Bundy and Ian Perry. Routledge Academic Books.

Isaacs, M. 2015. The Governability of the Small-Scale Fisheries Food System in South Africa – The Case of Snoek and West Coast Rock Lobster. Springer Academic Books.

Isaacs, M. 2011. Creating an Action Space: Small-Scale Fisheries Policy in South Africa. In Jentoft, S (ed.) Poverty Mosaics: Realities and Prospects in Small-Scale Fisheries. Poverty Mosaics. Springer Academic Books. 359-382.

 

Peer reviewed  International Research Reports:

Ortega, D, Isaacs M, Guttal S (2016) Sythesis Report on Civil Society experiences regarding use and implementation of the Tenure Guidelines and the challeng of monitoring CFS decisions. Civil Society Mechanism Committee (CSM) on World Food Security (CFS) WG on monitoring. CSO report on the use and application of the Voluntary Guidelines on Responsible Governance of Tenure (VGGT) as input to the Global Thematic Session during CFS 43.

HLPE. 2014. Sustainable fisheries and aquaculture for food security and nutrition. A report by the High Level Panel of Experts on Food Security and Nutrition, June 2014. UN, FAO, Committee on World Food Security (CFS).