9. Shrimp Farming as a Coastal Zone Challenge in Sergipe State, Brazil: Balancing Goals of Conservation and Social Justice

The coastal zone of Sergipe State in northeastern Brazil has undergone abrupt changes in recent decades due to multiple use of its resources, including farming of the exotic shrimp Penaeus vannamei. The rearing of marine shrimp became an important local economic activity in the late 1990s, occupying increasingly large areas on the coast. Shrimp farming in Sergipe State is practiced mainly through extensive family-based production systems in mangrove areas that have been declared Permanent Preservation Areas by Brazilian law. As a result, these family shrimp farms are considered illegal but the farms themselves long predate promulgation of the law and represent an important source of livelihood for hundreds of families. The rearing of marine shrimp has emerged as an important challenge faced by the Brazilian government in the management of national coastal resources. More intensive shrimp farms have been established just outside the mangrove and, while legal, have a more serious environmental impact on coastal ecosystems while generating limited social benefit compared to low-input family shrimp farms. This chapter discusses marine shrimp farming in the state of Sergipe from the perspective of both social justice and environmental conservation.