The initiative, coordinated by the OESA Foundation and supported by the Biodiversity Foundation, considers the different species farmed and the production systems used, as well as the different degree of development of aquaculture in each Mediterranean country.

The Mediterrane-On project has completed its first phase with the definition of a set of measurable and evaluable sustainability indicators for Mediterranean aquaculture.

The OESA Foundation, also attached to the Ministry of the Environment, Rural and Marine Affairs (MARM), in collaboration with the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) and the Business Association of Marine Crop Producers, has obtained the first results of the project.

The entities and experts participating in the work carried out have delved into the definition of sustainability indicators for the Mediterranean area, indicators that have been included in a guide that can be applied to all species, the production systems used and the different countries that make up the Mediterranean basin. This document aims to provide all the agents that make up the aquaculture sector with a first battery of indicators for implementation throughout the Mediterranean basin, which will allow progress in the sustainability of a strategic sector for the socio-economic development of a good number of Mediterranean countries, such as Spain.

This multidisciplinary work has made it possible to analyse the needs of the sector and the challenges to achieve greater sustainability, which will allow aquaculture to be an activity, if possible, more consolidated, widespread and valued in the Mediterranean area.

This is the starting point of a project that will continue in 2011. During this second year, the work will focus on the implementation of sustainability indicators in the Spanish case, as well as on the definition of new specific indicators, which complement those already defined for those production systems that use floating nurseries in the sea.  

In the second phase, Mediterrane-On will also collaborate with the General Fisheries Commission of the Mediterranean (GFCM/FAO) in the development of a pilot project for the selection of sustainability indicators at the local level, organized in Andalusia in the first half of the year. Among the activities is also the organization of a training course on sustainability indicators in aquaculture.

Mediterrane-On aims to advance in the awareness of aquaculture activity managers, in the first place, but also of society as a whole about the need to bet on aquaculture activity and contribute through it to an increasingly sustainable management of coastal and rural areas.

The full guide to sustainability indicators can be downloaded here.