Traditional fishing in the Mediterranean is disappearing

“If I had the support of the government, I would never have stopped fishing,” says Yiorgos Charalambous, a Cypriot from a fishing family who left the sea in 2015 when he needed more money to support his family. Although he also knitted nets for the fishermen, he has had to look for a second job since 2010. Today he meets Constantinos Nicolaou, an underwater archaeologist, at the tourist accommodation where he works as a maintenance man. Constantinos shows him photos of the restoration project of the Queen, his last professional fishing boat.

In 2004, Yiorgos joined the European Union’s permanent cessation programme, a policy implemented since the 1990s to reduce overfishing (1). In return for taking the boat out of the water, he could receive financial compensation depending on the characteristics of the boat, in his case €50,000 and €7,000 from the sale of the nets and the engine. “I called Constantinos to ask if there was any possibility of restoring and preserving the boat before destroying it. If he hadn’t insisted, they would have destroyed it,” explains Yorgos.

On paper, permanent cessation of fishing offers the possibility of giving the vessel to a cultural association to preserve the structure, with the same financial compensation. However, implementation is not the same in all Mediterranean fishing countries. In Cyprus, two decommissioning programmes have recently been implemented: in the first, in 2013, all 122 vessels were destroyed, while in 2015, all of them, around 110, were saved.

The Balearic boat museums

The Balearic Islands are one of the examples where more boats have been saved. Tòful Mus gives guided tours at Robadones, an old Menorcan quarry run by the Amics de la Mar association, where a hundred wooden boats are kept. We have two boats, Cala-Fons II and Moby Dick, and a llaut a traditional Balearic boat, Paloma, which was saved from destruction by the programme for the permanent cessation of fishing in the 1990s.

“The option of handing the boat over to an association to preserve it was introduced in 1994, thanks to a petition led by Catalans and Basques,” explains Manolo Gómez of the Mallorcan association Amics del Museu Marítim. The data on the decommissioning in the Balearic Islands is not public, but academic sources have calculated that the traditional small fleet has decreased by more than 40% since 1996. Among the various reasons there are the programmes to stop fishing.

Boat cull in Greece

The Greek islands have suffered the greatest destruction. Although no official figures are available, it is estimated that around 13,000 boats have been demolished. Yanis Psakis is a fisherman from Amorgos, an island in the Cyclades. He joined the programme in 2011. The EU gave him more money than he could have made selling the boat: €92,000. “The only option I had was to scrap it. We had heard that someone had taken it to a museum, but they said he hadn’t gotten the benefit. The Kaiki was of historical value and it was the family boat, so psychologically it was very difficult. The minister of Agriculture, forestry and fisheries came personally to make sure it was dismantled,” says Yanis.

Kostas Damianidis is working to open a museum on the nearby island of Samos dedicated to the preservation of traditional Aegean boats. “We have started negotiations with the ministry to implement this policy. The programme has been in place for 30 years and we have only been able to preserve about 30 vessels. We tried to stop this law, but we didn’t succeed,” he explains. 

The Ministry’s offer to preserve the boat has not always been successful, he adds: “It takes the fisherman months to get paid. It is also an expense for the cultural associations, because when the boat is not in the water it needs a lot more maintenance. They don’t get any help because the Ministry of Agriculture says it’s the responsibility of the Ministry of Culture, which doesn’t see it that way.”

Malta’s postcard luzzus 

In 2019, the clean-up department of the municipality of Marxaslokk, a fishing village in southern Malta, released a video showing the wrecking of Delia, an abandoned 100-year-old ferilla, the traditional Maltese wooden fishing boat. There was a lot of criticism and there seemed to be more awareness since then,” explains Ryan Abela, a member of the NGO Marxaslokk Heritage. A month after the interview, the municipality destroyed a luzzu owned by the organisation, which was to be restored in the following months.

The bay of Marxaslokk, the setting for the film Luzzu, starring a Maltese fisherman who also supports a permanent EU phase-out of fishing, is increasingly empty of net-weaving fishermen and the traditional colourful boats. The luzzu, another traditional wooden boat, has become the emblem of the island, appearing on almost every souvenir and tourist brochure. “People make money from the luzzus, but they don’t understand that if they are not restored, it will all be over,” argues Noel Demicoli of the Malta Traditional Boats Association. 

“The bay is turning white”, says Daniele Baraggioli, also a member of the association, referring to the dominant hue of the buildings, in contrast with the bright colours of the luzzus. “But you can’t put pressure on fishermen to preserve traditional boats because it might be more comfortable for them to use fibreglass boats,” he adds.

In Malta, the latest available data – analysed by a fishermen’s rights activist because it is not public either – shows that 96 boats had been destroyed by 2016. “The complete cessation of fishing has hit small boats the hardest, because they are more in need of economic compensation due to the precariousness of the sector. This is particularly the case in the Mediterranean, but not in the Atlantic or the Cantabrian Sea, where there are small boats that have some quota and survive,” says Clara Aguilera, former Socialist&Democrats MEP and member of the Fisheries Committee (PECH).

EU regulation and fishermen’s precariousness

Rodolico’s workshop in Aci Trezza, in eastern Sicily, is now a showcase for tourists, and there are few feluca left in the bay in front of it. Salvatore is the last generation of a family of boatbuilders: “It’s the bureaucracy that has destroyed the business, much more than fibreglass boats,” he argues. The disappearance of traditional fishing also means the disappearance of professions linked to the sector. His workshop used to employ up to 40 people.

The Valastro family moor their boat near the workshop. Since the beginning of July, their boat has been transformed into a place where tourists can learn about traditional fishing. “We decided to go into fishing tourism because it was a way to make more money in the summer,” they explain. Concetto and Guiseppe Valastro, father and son, point out that increasing bureaucracy and EU regulations are one of the main reasons for the precariousness of the sector. “We are very close to Tunisia, and fishermen from third countries do not face such severe restrictions, for example on the type of nets they can use.”

“The European Union’s common policy applies the same fisheries policy to all member states: Brussels has a great lack of knowledge, the Nordic fishing boats are not the same as ours,” stresses Domingo Bonnín, president of the Federation of Cofradias of the Balearic Islands. Moreover, the laws favour the fishing industry: “We cannot compete, we are at rock bottom,” say members of the Maltese fishermen’s cooperative, where tuna is the main source of income. “When we joined the European Union in 2004, we were promised that traditional fishing would be protected, but it has been destroyed,” they add.

“Since then, there have been more and more trawlers and large international fishing ships. Small fishermen are forced to sell their boats because the big companies offer to buy them. Then they scrap them and add the fishermen’s quotas to their own,” says a Maltese fishermen’s rights activist, speaking on condition of anonymity. “What’s more, if you don’t catch a certain amount of fish, they take away your quota and a bigger ship buys it,” he adds. Some of the Maltese fishermen we interviewed have rented out their quota to industrial fisheries: it is more profitable for them than going out to fish.

The need for quotas that favour traditional vessels and more aid for fleet modernisation are some of the solutions that MEP Clara Aguilera believes are needed: “If trawling is limited, traditional fishing could be sustainable. If you read the documents and listen to the debates, it seems that we are all in favour of traditional fishing, but the reality of the government’s actions is different.”

“Greek boats are what make the Greek people”

In mid-June, the fishermen of Amorgos prepare for their feast. Michalis catches the fish that will be offered to the islanders “to thank them for buying fish from us for the rest of the year”. Dimitria chops up the leftovers to make fish soup. Nikola spends hours in the kitchens of the monastery of Agia Paraskevi, battering and frying the small fish that will accompany the main course, a fish randomly distributed to each of the more than 300 people present. White wine and syrtos, the island’s traditional dance, complete the meal and extend the evening until five in the morning.

Yoannis Vekris is one of the few young people on the island to take up the family baton. He has been at sea since the age of 10. In 2018, his father had to sell the kaiki: financial problems and Yoannis’s university fees were the main reasons. “It was very hard for my father. Greek boats are what make the Greek people,” he says. Nine months later they bought a fibreglass skiff. He combines fishing with a degree in fisheries and aquaculture technology: “We have to look for alternatives through education to reinvent the sector,” he argues.

“The lack of fish is another major problem, along with invasive species such as lionfish,” he adds. To tackle the fish shortage, Amorgos wants to pilot a ban on fishing in April and May, during the regeneration period. During these months, the fishermen will “fish for rubbish” while receiving public benefits. The project is a proposal by the fishermen’s association Amorgama, together with Blue Marine and the Cyclades Fund. “In general in our sector there is no unity among fishermen, but in Amorgos it’s a bit different, I like it that way, in the sea we already have to fight alone,” concludes Yoannis.

The decline of small boats and traditional fishermen is a fact, even if the data is not officially published in any of the Mediterranean countries. Wooden boats and fishing families are an integral part of the landscape, culture and history of this part of the world. With the right regulations, traditional fishing can be sustainable and can become the solution for a sea where there are fewer and fewer fish. However, European policy, standardised and focused on industrial fishing, with government policy following the same direction, is leading to the destruction of the sector.

🤝  This article has been produced with the support of Journalismfund Europe. It is published within the Come Together collaborative project

Footnote

1) The regulation has been in place since 1991, but in 1994 the option of cessation without destruction was added. The regulation has been updated regularly, but the latest version is regulation 2021/1139 of 7 July 2021. The specific regulation can be found in article 20.