A total of nineteen fishing gears surrounding nets, trammel nets, fish traps and longlines- were recovered from the seabeds of the Catalan littoral in 2019 in the last campaign of the project Evitem la pesca fantasma, an initiative that was launched to protect the biodiversity of the ocean ecosystems under the scientific supervision of Bernat Hereu, lecturer at the Faculty of Biology and the Biodiversity Research Institute (IRBio) of the University of Barcelona.
The localization and recovery task of the fishing gears was funded by the Directorate General for Fisheries and Maritime Affairs of the Catalan Government, in an action as part of the multi-annual plan for the Maritime Strategy of Catalonia (2018-2021) approved of by the Government, in which the line of action 48 predicts actions for the minimization of negative effects of the lost fishing gears on marine ecosystems.
The project Evitem la pesca fantasma had a first phase of qualitative diagnosis of the situation through online surveys, a second phase of localization through participative sessions, and last, the extraction of localized gears. The nineteen fishing gears that were recovered tools with a 1,360 square meters extension- were found by members of the Catalan Federation of Underwater Activities (FECDAS). In November 2019, the campaign for the extraction of lost fishing gears in marine floors was led by the Directorate General for Fisheries and counted on the advice from the team of experts of the project Evitem la pesca fantasma of the UB and IRBio.
The 40% of the fishing gears that were taken were found on the coral the most affected biological community by this problem- and in a lower level, on rocks and sea floors. Regarding the impact on the marine life, a hundred and eighteen species were identified as affected. Out of these, twenty-eight were trapped and thirty-six were taken or broken due to the effect of the lost items (among these, species with great ecological and structural importance such as red coral, gorgonian and bryozoan species). The results of the project that was carried out during 2019 were presented on February 15, as part of the 21st edition of the Mediterranean Diving Show in the Cornellà Fair.