“For hundreds of years, West African fishermen have been fishing the Atlantic waters off their respective countries' coasts. The region's fisheries, ports and beaches play a massive role in the area's economy, where thousands of people work in tourism, importing/exporting industries, and in fisheries. My on-going project is an examination of how the endangered blackfin guitarfish are used as a source of food-scarcity and how the decline of this species is causing a shift in the fishermen and their families’ income & lifestyles. 

Elasmobranchs (which include sharks, rays) are either caught intentionally or as bycatch in Ghana in and Cameroon. They are both a source of cheap meat for the rural coastal community, and a source of income for artisanal fishermen. Elasmobranch's fins are also sold into a profitable export market. The species' critical role in local economies has led to overfishing and a rapid decline in populations.

Issah Seidu, a PhD candidate at  Kwame Nkrumah University of Science & Technology in Ghana, has found that more than 70 percent of the sharks and rays he has studied were ‘of global conservation concern and were listed as threatened, facing extreme risk of extinction in the wild.’ 

AMCO is now conducting research along the southern coastline. In a region where upward mobility is scarce and the majority of rural coastal residents are low-income, how does a researcher convince a community to care about an animal that functions as a pivotal resource to their survival?

This project’s goal is to use photography to illuminate awareness of how West African researchers are conducting research to help save and protect sharks and rays. The protection of these species also supports artisanal fishermen, who sell their product for profit or dried and used as a source of protein. 

With the support of Save Our Seas foundation, I traveled to both Ghana and Cameroon to document the conduction of elasmobranch research in these areas, as well as how the  beach and oceans fit into the Western African lifestyle. In February of 2024 I became a NatGeoExplorer and because of their support, I will be returning in 2025 to continue my work on this project."

-Gabriella Angotti Jones