Line of action:

Status:

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General Objective:

To promote the environmental, social and economic sustainability of recreational sea fishing by organising an international symposium on this practice and drawing up a code of good practice for its application in Spain.

Specific objectives:

1. Identify and promote synergies within the consortium and outside it.
2. Analyse the impacts of PMR, research, management and governance needs, and future opportunities.
3. To analyze the research needs in relation to the PNDB (DCF).
4. To analyse collaboration programmes between scientists, managers and fishermen.
5. To analyze the possible impacts of lost PMR gear, selectivity associated with the gear and the practice of no-kill (C&R) fishing.
6. To analyse the possible impact of climate change on PMR.
7. To analyse the economic relevance and commercial opportunities of PRM.
8. To analyse the challenges and opportunities of the interaction between sectors of activity, users and interest groups in relation to coastal ecosystems and the services they provide in the context of integrated ecosystem management and blue growth.
9. To analyze the participation of women in the PMR.
10. Raise awareness among fishermen about practices to promote environmental, economic and social sustainability.
11. Disseminate project results, including CBP for PMR.

The main activity of the project was the organization of the international symposium on PRM, under the title ISMAREF 2018, to facilitate communication and exchange of experiences between scientists, fisheries managers, recreational and commercial fishers and other users of coastal ecosystems, as well as the cohesion of recreational fishermen’s associations around ecology issues, economics, sociology and management that affect Recreational Maritime Fishing in Spain.

Through different oral and written presentations -with the participation of 100 experts in the field-, aspects such as the impacts of PMR, research needs, collaboration programs between agents, their management and economic framework and the effects of climate change on this activity have been discussed, in order to define and improve future management and research actions within the framework of the sustainability of PMR.

During the event, the attendees agreed on a Code of Good Practice and a diptych for PRM in Spain, which includes recommendations aimed at fishermen to promote responsible fishing with the environment and with the rest of the users of marine ecosystems.

Among the conclusions of ISMAREF 2018, the recommendation of the experts to urgently review the current licensing system to improve its effectiveness as an information platform aimed at improving the management of the activity stands out. To this end, a Working Group on PMR in Spain was created during the symposium, which has developed a proposal to homogenise PRM licensing systems. It is expected that this group will contribute significantly to offering recommendations that guide future fisheries research actions and management policies in the field of Recreational Maritime Fishing.

Finally, a bibliographic analysis on recreational fishing was carried out, obtaining a total of 116 works in Spain published until 2018, whose main objective has been the study of different ecological aspects related to PMR, in 75.9% of these works, and with socioeconomic and ecological information in 61.2% of the total.