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Sammanfattning

Despite the promise of inland small-scale aquaculture for improving food security and alleviating poverty, the long-term sustainability of such production systems remains poorly understood, particularly in contexts where economic and ecological processes reinforce each other. This paper develops a stylized social-ecological model that captures feedbacks between producer wealth, fish biomass, and nutrient dynamics in inland pond-based small-scale aquaculture systems. The model reveals how these intertwined feedbacks shape the long-term dynamics of the system and lead to monostability, bistability, or multistability. These regimes correspond to a collapse, a high-yield but high-risk, and a sustainable equilibrium in fish production. Using bifurcation and stability analysis, we identify six dynamic scenarios: Balanced efficiency, Overload, Flux, Knife-edge, Tipping pond and Decay, that represent qualitatively different long-term outcomes. Rather than predicting specific outcomes, the model gives a structural understanding of small-scale aquaculture system dynamics and highlights the importance of local context and producers' heterogeneity in shaping the outcomes. It also provides a theoretical foundation for scenario-based management and empirical model development.

Nyckelord

Bifurcation; Bistability; Dynamical system; Social-ecological system; Pond aquaculture; Sustainable intensification

Publicerad i

Ecological Modelling
2026, volym: 512, artikelnummer: 111416
Utgivare: ELSEVIER

SLU författare

UKÄ forskningsämne

Ekologi

Publikationens identifierare

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecolmodel.2025.111416

Permanent länk till denna sida (URI)

https://res.slu.se/id/publ/145292