Today they are less than 10% of their historic high in the late 1980s when more than 10 million kgs of Chambo were landed by small scale fishermen every year.Īs a result, fisheries increasingly focus on smaller, less valuable species to sustain catches. This fish is highly prized as a food fish but, because of unsustainable fishing practices, catches have plummeted. The Chambo, a species of endemic tilapia, is also under pressure. Once abundant, this species has almost disappeared mainly because of the degradation of river catchments and sedimentation that smothers the gavel beds that they need for spawning. These fish migrate into rivers to spawn and so depend on the health of rivers that feed into the lake for their survival. The worst hit fish species are migratory endemic cyprinids, such as the critically endangered Ntchila. This is particularly true in the larger, more valuable, species. Over-fishing has led to less diversity in the kinds of fish that are caught and has reduced the amount of fish caught by individual fishers. Trading fish at Cape Maclear, Lake Malawi. This is worrying not only from a biodiversity perspective, but also because this is one of Africa’s poorest regions and people rely on the fish for their livelihoods and for food. A recent assessment by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) listed 9% of its evaluated species as “endangered”. Human activities, like deforestation in the lake’s catchment area and over-fishing, are taking their toll on the lake. Despite this Lake Malawi is under threat. Located between Malawi, Tanzania and Mozambique, it covers an area of more than 29,000 square kilometres, and holds 7% of the world’s available surface freshwater. As a result of this exceptional diversity the lake is considered a global biodiversity treasure because almost all of the species that it contains occur nowhere else on the planet. New species are discovered regularly and some scientists believe that the lake may contain more than 2000 species. With more than 1000 fish species, Lake Malawi has more distinct fish species than any other lake in the world. This is worrying, not least because the lake, and the fish species that occupy it, are very unique. An estimated 9% of the 458 fish species assessed in Lake Malawi are at high risk of extinction.
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