The report on the state of marine recreational fisheries in Catalonia in 2023 is now available

You can now download the report State of Marine Recreational Fisheries in Catalonia 2023 in the Publications section

Marine recreational fishing is a non-professional activity practiced for leisure by approximately 350 million people worldwide. Despite being one of the most popular coastal leisure activities globally, there is a historical lack of knowledge about its impacts, as well as a general lack of data collection, sampling and assessment systems for the activity. For this reason, ICATMAR launched a continuous monitoring program for marine recreational fisheries in Catalonia in 2020. The goal of the program is to compile a time series of data on catches and species records to provide a reliable and robust information source for decision-making in potential management strategies.

In this report, which you can download from the Publications section, the results of the continuous monitoring of marine recreational fisheries in Catalonia conducted by ICATMAR during 2023 are presented, comparing them with the period 2020-2022. In the different sections, you will find, among others, indicators for the different fishing modalities practiced in the region, namely shore angling, boat angling, and spearfishing. Additionally, you can also download a drop-down summary with the main results of the report in Catalan.

Source: Marta Pujol-Baucells

Download the latest ICATMAR reports

The latest ICATMAR reports are now available in the Publications section.

First of all, State of fisheries in Catalonia 2022, Part 1 explains the methodology of the continuous fisheries monitoring along the Catalan coast carried out by ICATMAR over the last four years. This is followed by the results of the scientific monitoring of the bottom-trawl, purse seine and small-scale fisheries (sonsera, common octopus and, for the first time, blue crab).

State of fisheries in Catalonia 2022, Part 2, presents the stock assessment of the main species included in the Western Mediterranean Multiannual Plan for demersal fisheries management (WMMAP): hake, red mullet, Norway lobster, blue and red shrimp and deep-water rose shrimp. In addition, it also includes, for the first time, the assessment of the Europeam sardine and anchovy stocks present on the Catalan coast, reference species of the Management Plan for the purse seine fishery.

Finally, Fisheries advisory report for the Northern GSA6 2023 is a compilation of fisheries management considerations for the FAO GSA-6 area, the geographical sub-area where the coasts of Catalonia are located. It consists of a series of proposals and approaches on issues such as increasing the selectivity of bottom-trawl gear, the implementation of doors without bottom contact and the effectiveness of permanent no-take areas, among others.