Desarrollo Sostenible de las Pesquerías Artesanales del Arco Atlántico

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The strong presence of artisanal fisheries along the Atlantic coast, assumes increasing importance due to a variety of factors, namely, the great diversity of fishing gears and target species; the high commercial value of the products; the large number of fishermen and stakeholders involved; the socio-economic and cultural importance at local, regional and national level and the decreasing importance of the traditional fisheries undertaken by long distant fleets in third countries. Despite its importance, artisanal fisheries are poorly recognized at both national and EU levels. This reflects the fact that artisanal fishermen are poorly organized and therefore weakly represented in local, regional, nationaland European administration agencies. Artisanal fisheries have been heavily penalized by the rising of fuel prices and problems concerning marketing and distribution of the fishing products, leading to lower profitability of the fishing activity and consequently to the increase of fishing effort over coastal resources. Furthermore, the low economic diversification that characterizes most fishing communities makes them highly dependent on this activity. Therefore, the collapse of any fishing resource exploited by the artisanal fleet has a relevant impact on local economy. In this context, PRESPO aims to build up a set of scientific information to improve artisanal fisheries management, thus increasing their sustainability in biological, environmental, social and economic terms.

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