Developing a sustainability index for the sea urchin fishery in partnership with the sector

Throughout this summer, SOST-Erizo partners such as Centro de Investigaciones Marinas (CIMA) of Consellería do Mar, Mareira Bizi, and FOL have been meeting with sea urchin harvesters in several participatory workshops to involve the sector in the research action from the beginning.

In the framework of the project, four workshops were organised. In the first workshop, the SOST-Erizo project and its objectives were presented, in addition to lecture the sector in  the biological and ecological aspects of sea urchin. In the second workshop, the methodology to be used in the project for the creation of the sustainability index and its indicators was explained, and some examples were given, such as the minimum catch size, the fishing effort, the price, etc. In this way, it was possible to define together with the sector the indicators that best fit their fishery and how these are used to build the sustainability index. Subsequently, and after selecting the indicators, in the third workshop the sea urchin fishermen were surveyed in order to obtain the necessary information for each indicator. The data provided by the fishermen, and the technical assistance through the surveys and those provided by CIMA- Consellería do Mar were analysed, and a sustainability value was obtained for each fishermen’s association participating in the study. These results were presented to the sector at the fourth workshop.

FOL would like to thank all the people involved in the project for their interest and active participation, which made it possible to obtain the index.

This project will soon be presented in a final event at the Federación Galega de Cofradías de Pescadores where the whole sector, the administration are invited to discuss the project and its results.