Executive Summary

Crab Island is located on the southwest of Rodrigues, and lies some 350 m offshore of Plaine Corail at its closest point to the mainland. Crab Island is about 1.1 km long in the east-west axis and 0.8 km wide in the north-south axis; at about 42.75 ha, Crab Island is the largest of all the islets around Rodrigues.

The greater part of Crab Island consists of basaltic rock combined with a calcarenitic peninsula on the northeast side.

The majority of the island cover is not native, but some important remnant species and communities remain but are under severe threat of local extinction if the current environmentally degrading trends are allowed to continue. Overgrazing by sheep has lead to erosion, exposing rock bare soil in between the patches of grass. The vegetation of Crab Island is largely dominated by the invasive alien Acacia (Leucaena leucocephala) particularly in areas where the soil was relatively deep. In areas of soil depletion, the acacia tends to disappear giving way to weedy shrubby associations. Nevertheless, Crab Island has the richest native flora of all the islets of Rodrigues. There are some species of conservation importance such as Dodonaea viscosa and Cassine orientalis, which are threatened. However, regeneration in several species seems to be critically low or absent.

The Rodrigues centipede, which is reported to be close to extinction on the mainland, still exists on Crab. It is likely that Crab Island also harbours the best invertebrate fauna of the islets visited.

Rats are present on the islet, as there is substantial source of food and water.

It is proposed that Crab Island could be developed as a nature park, which would serve as a conservation field centre for education and public awareness, and at the same time provide local recreational facilities.

An Integrated Zonal Management (IZM) plan is proposed, in which zones are dedicated to education and public awareness, recreation and conservation.

It is proposed that the islet development and management be implemented through strong community participation. The community should be regarded as one of the development partners. Ideally, the community-based activities should be able to potentially generate revenue, either through sales of medicinal plants or through cooperative sharing of revenues gained through eco-tourism or local recreational activities.

A representative community-based local management assembly is established consisting interested groups (education, NGO and commercial), as well as existing users (e.g. fishermen) to determine and organise activities on the islets within the management plan framework. This local assembly would be the prime organisation, which would determine activity and usage of Crab Island.

A Logical Framework is proposed to deliver activities under the following areas:

• Conservation.

• Construction of walkways and educational signage.

• Infrastructure developments for camping and day visitors.

• Reduction of fire hazard.

• Local awareness and negotiation on role of MPA.

• Establishment of local community management assembly.

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