Zanzibar sea cucumber venture blends conservation with community profits

Pemba Island, Tanzania — Residents of Shamiani village on Pemba Island are testing a new approach to coastal conservation and livelihoods by partnering with Asili, a Tanzania-based aquaculture company, to ranch sea cucumbers in protected marine areas. The initiative aims to restore depleted ecosystems, generate income from high-value sea products, and share profits with local communities.

For generations, the coastal waters of Pemba Island have supported fishing families. But over time, residents say nearshore resources have declined due to warming waters, habitat degradation, and decades of fishing pressure. Sea cucumbers, once abundant, have become scarce, forcing fishers and gleaners to work harder for smaller returns. The new project seeks to reverse this trend by combining conservation with economic opportunity.

Asili began working with Pemba communities in 2022 to establish sea cucumber ranching within locally protected zones. The model involves community-led management, where sections of seagrass meadows are closed off to allow sea cucumber populations to recover. Co-founder Tim Kluckow emphasized that the project required extensive dialogue with villagers to address concerns about access, income, and profit sharing.

“This didn’t happen quickly,” Kluckow said. “We spent many hours discussing what it means when the area will be closed, what incomes will be generated, and how revenues will be shared.”

Sea cucumbers are among the ocean’s most valuable marine products, prized in East and Southeast Asia, particularly China, for their use in food and traditional medicine. The U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization has warned that global demand has driven overexploitation of wild populations, making mariculture—a specialized form of aquaculture in saltwater environments—an attractive alternative. Alexandra Garcin, Asili’s co-founder, noted that sea cucumber holds elite status in Asian markets, where prices can reach $70 to $80 per kilogram at harvest.

Jennifer Howard of Conservation International, which is familiar with Asili’s model, said the high value of sea cucumbers offers communities a chance to earn significant income. However, she cautioned against over-reliance on a single commodity, noting that price fluctuations and market dynamics could pose risks. Tanzania has been a major exporter of sea cucumbers, with nearly 500,000 kilograms shipped to Hong Kong between 2012 and 2019, according to previous reporting.

Ecologically, sea cucumbers play a vital role as “ecosystem engineers,” recycling nutrients and oxygenating sediments. Garcin compared their function to earthworms in soil, highlighting the importance of protecting habitats to support broader marine health. The project links ranching to no-take or low-take zones to ensure ecological benefits.

In Shamiani, about 300 of the village’s 900 adults have joined the cooperative model. Many participants are women and young people who have helped build patrol systems and prepare protected zones. Sharif Tano Sharif, a local resident, expressed optimism about the project’s potential benefits. “Based on what we are seeing, we think it’s going to bring a lot of benefits and profit,” he said.

Asili’s model aims to avoid past pitfalls in coastal aquaculture, where benefits often flowed to a few while communities saw little change. Under the agreement, future harvest profits would be split equally between the company and the community. Half of the community share would go directly to participants, while the other half would fund broader needs like education, water access, or livelihood development.

Kluckow said the model was shaped by lessons from Madagascar, where earlier sea cucumber projects benefited some farmers but did little for the wider village. “What we saw is that after two years of making an income, the water situation wasn’t better; the healthcare situation wasn’t better; the school wasn’t better,” he said.

The project faces challenges. The farm is not yet generating revenue, and sea cucumbers take a year to year-and-a-half to reach marketable size. The hatchery, which produces juveniles for stocking, is central to the effort. The company’s agreement with the community is also still evolving, requiring ongoing trust-building and adaptation.

If successful, Asili’s model could offer a blueprint for balancing conservation and economic development in coastal communities across East Africa.

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