Comparing commercial, recreational and illegal coastal fishery catches and their economic values: A survey from the southern Mediterranean Sea

Abstract

Commercial small‐scale fishing in the Mediterranean Sea accounts for more than 80% of the commercial fishing fleet. Commercial small‐scale fishing competes with non‐professional fishing, such as recreational and illegal fishing. Fisheries statistics usually fail to report non‐professional fishing data. The aim of this study was to investigate the competition between fishing categories (commercial, recreational and illegal fishing) and their temporal variability in two future Marine Protected Areas in Tunisia. Over a 2‐year period, 213 small‐scale coastal fisheries landings were monitored. Additional socio‐economic information was collected using direct questionnaires. Results highlighted that: (a) at least 47.91% of non‐professional fishers admitted selling the catch (and so were classified as illegal fishers); (b) illegal and recreational fishing mean catch per fishers per day, represented, respectively, 40% and 20% of commercial fishing; (c) catch rates and species richness for illegal and commercial fishing followed the same temporal patterns at both locations; (d) all fishing categories fished high trophic levels and vulnerable species; and (e) potential economic values of illegal and recreational fishing catch were significantly higher than those of commercial fishing. These findings provide quantitative evidence of competition between illegal and legal (commercial and recreational) fishing in the Mediterranean Sea.

An Assessment of Catches of Shore and Boat Recreational Angling along the Coast of the Adriatic Sea

“…Hence, an additional problem is that an unknown proportion of recreational fishers, driven by the high demand for valuable species, especially in touristic areas, are selling their catch although it is strictly prohibited. This illegal activity is widespread over the entire Mediterranean region [6,19,20] but hard to monitor and inspect. The main reasons are the relatively small individual catches that are easy to be sold very fast, the high number of recreational fishers and boats at sea and, as in the case of the Croatian Adriatic, a very long coastline (more than 6000 km length) where systematic surveillance is ineffective.…”

Recreational and small-scale fisheries may pose a threat to vulnerable species in coastal and offshore waters of the western Mediterranean

“…Furthermore, minimum landing sizes should be implemented for all vulnerable species, whereas maximum landing sizes should be also implemented for sex-changing species such as E. marginatus, Pagrus pagrus and L. viridis in order to preserve their reproductive potential (Lloret et al, 2012).. In light of recent evidence of strong competition between illegal and legal fishing (by both professional and recreational fishers) in the Mediterranean Sea (Ben Lamine et al, 2018), it is also paramount to combine protective measures with an effective enforcement (Sadovy de Mitcheson et al, 2013), and to promote greater public awareness, which can lead to support for legislation and action at the consumer end of the supply chain by empowering customers to make better seafood choices, for example, by avoiding the consumption or the catch of vulnerable species. In this sense, public awareness will contribute to the so-called "rewilding" initiatives, which are emerging as a promising restoration strategy in a human-dominated world to promote self-sustaining ecosystems and enhance the conservation status of biodiversity (Torres et al, 2018).…”

“…Recreational fishing (RF) in the Mediterranean, according to Font et al (2012), comprises all non-commercial fishing that is carried out for leisure or sport, where the catch -the selling of which is illegal -is for one's own consumption (or for family and friends). It is particularly popular in the European Mediterranean, with the total number of recreational sea fishers estimated to be approximately 2.8 million (Hyder et al, 2018), but also in non-European countries such as Tunisia (Ben Lamine et al, 2018) and Turkey (Tunca et al, 2016).The Mediterranean has an extensive coastline, a huge population living in coastal areas (150 million people according to IUCN, 2019) and the importance of fishing as a leisure or tourist activity is increasing (Font et al, 2012). The expenditure by European recreational sea fishers in the Mediterranean has been estimated to be around €0.92 billion (Hyder et al, 2018).…”

The COVID-19 pandemic has altered illegal fishing activities inside and outside a marine protected area

“…Previously, both professional and amateur fishers illegally targeted mostly invertebrate feeders and piscivores with high mobility that form medium and large biomass aggregations, demonstrating intentional switching on the part of illegal fishers to target species with higher commercial value and large body size ( Figure 1 D,E). This pattern of ‘trophy’ fishing has been observed in other conservation areas in northeastern Brazil 6 and can be associated with the higher price of large, threatened species meant to offset pandemic-driven economic losses 7 , on top of the generally low monthly salary for fishers in Brazil (∼$US 200 mo –1 ).…”