Activist for Rights of
Small Scale Fishworkers
Among Missing on Malaysia 370

Chandrika Sharma in Prainha do Canto Verde, Brazil, at the 20th anniversary of the fish workers collective in 2006. ICSF photo

Chandrika Sharma is known internationally for her representation of small scale and artisanal fishermen. She worked to develop international guidelines that would protect the rights to access of fishermen around the world. She was on the way to an FAO meeting in Asia to help fishing communities protect their rights in the face of a rapidly expanding market economy there when her flight disappeared.

The predatory forces driving small scale fishermen out of fishing grounds are influencing who fishes around the world. Sharma used her great networking and communication skills to bring people together in the common cause of fishworker’s rights.

Sharma earned a masters degree in social work in 1989 and later a Ph.D. at the Center for Development Studies in Kerala, India. In 1998 she began working for the International Collective in Support of Fishworkers where she wrote for its newspaper and helped fisherfolk fight back against quasi-governmental institutions attempting to privatize the ocean resources. She was later instrumental in developing United Nations Guidelines on Securing Sustainable Small-Scale Fisheries.

Sharma leaves a husband and daughter in India.

For more about Chandrika Sharma, see http://www.nationalfisherman.com/blogs/the-rudderpost/3388-shared-struggle.