As part of our commitment and firm beliebe on the necessary involvement of fishers in tghe studies and co-design of mitigatinion measures, we had a fruitful round of meetings in 4 major fishing ports in Galicia (Vigo, Marín, A Guarda, Burela) where researchers, FPOs representatives and skippers exchanged views on bycatch of megafauna, impacts on the ecosystem and fishers themselves, mitigation measures and common goals to work together to cope with the issue.
We went through vibrant work sessions with experienced skippers participating in the discussion and providing key information on fishing operations and megafauna interactions, areas, seasons, extent, frequency and their expectative on the project return for the industry.
FPOs managers and technical staff also provided relevant information on the regulatory framework, and the proactive aptitude to be nowadays an industry fully committed to fishing sustainability and aligned with policies and recommendations to notably reduce the ratio of ETPs bycatch.
Interesting opportunities for collaborative work between REDUCE and these FPOs emerged around different topics like EMS, bycatch monitoring data, onboard trials,tagging, observer collaborative program, socioeconomics, fishers´ ecologic knowledge, etc for cocreation of feasible mitigation measures.
