Date: 27 February 2026
To: The South African Human Rights Commission
Per email: foodinquiry@sahrc.org.za
Name of organisation: Coastal Links and Masifundise Development Trust
Submission to SAHRC on the National Investigative Hearing into The Food Systems of South Africa
1. Introduction
Coastal Links and Masifundise welcome the opportunity to contribute to the South African Human Rights Commission’s call for submissions to the National Investigative Hearing on South Africa’s food systems.
Coastal Links South Africa is a community-based organisation founded in 2005 by small-scale fishers from rural communities in the Western Cape. In 2012, Coastal Links grew into a national organisation representing small-scale fishing communities across four coastal provinces: Northern Cape, Western Cape, Eastern Cape, and KwaZulu-Natal. Since 2025, Coastal Links has established a presence among inland small-scale fishers who rely on freshwater resources such as rivers and dams in the Northern Cape, Free State, and Eastern Cape. Coastal Links has a membership of over 5,000 people from rural fishing communities. Coastal Links seeks to create better and more sustainable living conditions for small-scale fishers and their communities. Its members have been instrumental in several legal cases advancing small-scale fishers’ right to food, including: the Kenneth George v DEAT[1] equality court case, which led to the development of the 2012 Small-Scale Fisheries Policy; the ground-breaking Gongqose Supreme Court of Appeal case[2], which recognised customary fishing rights; the Sustain the Wild Coast Communities v Shell case[3]; and the 2022 Christian Adams v Searcher case,[4] both of which asserted fishers’ right to food and right to equality and participation as grounds to interdict oil and gas exploration.
Masifundise is a civil society organisation that has worked with rural small-scale fishing (SSF) communities for over 20 years, supporting mobilisation and organisation-building towards the recognition and realisation of human rights. Our work seeks to contribute to an environmentally, socially, and economically just political and institutional framework in which small-scale fishing communities can exercise their rights to livelihoods, food, and nutrition, and strengthen their food sovereignty.
Fish is a vital source of food and nutrition for millions of people worldwide. For customary fishing communities, however, fishing is far more than a source of sustenance or income; it is deeply tied to livelihoods, cultural identity, spirituality, knowledge systems, and ways of life maintained across generations. These practices and relationships are essential not only for present well-being but also for future generations.
In South Africa, traditional fisher peoples (now recognised in policy as small-scale fishers) include men, women, and youth from coastal and inland communities who depend on marine[5] and freshwater[6] resources for food and income. This includes those who directly harvest resources as well as those engaged in associated value-chain activities such as net-making, boat-building, processing, trading, barter, and local distribution of fish. Small-scale fishers are also food producers who play a very important role in contributing to food and nutrition for many coastal communities in the country.
During the colonial and apartheid regimes, fishing communities were dispossessed of their coastal lands and denied access to marine resources on the basis of racial discrimination[7]. This caused profound injustices and undermined their ability to secure food for themselves, their families, and their communities. Despite post-apartheid commitments to inclusion and transformation, many small-scale fishers remain excluded from decision-making processes, denied access to customary fishing grounds, and subjected to harassment and criminalisation[8]. In 2024, Masifundise and Coastal Links South Africa convened the first Fisher Peoples’ Tribunal, which documented ongoing human rights and environmental violations and highlighted the cultural, ecological, and food-provisioning contributions of fishing communities. This submission demonstrates that the right to food of small-scale fishers in South Africa is being undermined. Although a progressive policy framework exists that recognises small-scale fishers as rights-holders, state and private control over marine resources continues to prevent meaningful access. As a result, many fishing households are unable to sustain their livelihoods or adequately feed their families, revealing a critical gap between legal recognition and lived reality within South Africa’s food system.
Click here to read the FULL submission