This week sees the famous MAVA Foundation officially cease its operations.  

Since its creation in 1994 by naturalist Dr Luc Hoffmann – who also co-founded the World Wildlife Fund (WWF), the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), Wetlands International and several other globally important environmental organizations – MAVA has made more than 1 300 grants totalling over 1 billion euros to fund conservation projects that benefit people and nature alike.  

Four of those grants went to projects which the GFCM either led or took part in, and the results are informing key aspects of our work today. MAVA’s focus on collaborative science and research was an ideal fit for the approach the GFCM takes, and with MAVA’s support we’re pleased to have achieved some notable successes. 

Medbycatch: filling knowledge gaps to better protect vulnerable species and manage fisheries 

In 2017, MAVA funded a project that ran for five years: “Understanding Mediterranean multitaxa bycatch of vulnerable species and testing mitigation – a collaborative approach”, known as Medbycatch for short. The “collaborative approach” in the title refers to the strong partnership behind the project, which involved the GFCM working with the Agreement on the Conservation of Cetaceans of the Black Sea, Mediterranean Sea and contiguous Atlantic area (ACCOBAMS), the Specially Protected Areas Regional Activity Centre (SPA/RAC), IUCN-Med, BirdLife Europe and Central Asia, the Mediterranean Association to Save the Sea Turtles (MEDASSET), and WWF’s Mediterranean Marine Initiative. 

 ©GFCM/Claudia Amico 

The goal of Medbycatch was to address the knowledge gaps surrounding the important issue of the incidental catch of vulnerable species groups – specifically sea turtles, marine mammals, seabirds, elasmobranchs and macrobenthic invertebrates – and explore how bycatch levels could be reduced. The project was regional in scope while focusing its fieldwork initially on Morocco, Tunisia and Türkiye, as well as Croatia and Italy from 2020. 

The starting point was to establish a robust data collection methodology so a harmonized knowledge base could be developed to support pan-Mediterranean decision-making. Bycatch monitoring programmes that included on-board observations, landing site questionnaires and self-sampling techniques were put in place in the participating countries– notably, a side activity explored how best to build successful collaborations between fishers and observers.  

The information collected formed a solid foundation for the identification and testing of potential mitigation measures, which included changing net soak times and depths, trialling circle hooks on longlines, using acoustic pingers with purse seines, and bycatch reduction devices (e.g. grids, panels) for trawlers. 

The multidisciplinary, science-based project attracted encouraging buy-in from a wide range of stakeholders around the Mediterranean, a fact that has proved crucial for the sustainability component of its activities. Many of the participating fishers have become strong advocates for healthy marine ecosystems, and their engagement means that scaling up efforts on a regional basis is a realistic prospect. This has been supported by the publication of an identification guide to vulnerable species, available in six languages, which also includes pocket subregional versions. The project also produced good practice guides for the handling of vulnerable species (translated into seven languages), a regional review on bycatch in the Mediterranean, and ad-hoc studies on a variety of complementary topics. 

While MAVA’s involvement is now over, the project’s success continues to contribute to the GFCM 2030 Strategy, which includes the development of a regional plan of action to mitigate bycatch. 

Dolphin depredation: protecting fishers’ livelihoods as well as cetaceans 

The GFCM 2030 Strategy also targets a reduction in dolphin depredation – the term for when dolphins remove catch directly from fishing gear. This is a lose-lose situation for dolphins and fishers alike: dolphins can be accidentally caught and killed as they raid nets looking for a meal, while the damage they cause to catches and gear can impact fishers’ livelihoods. 

In 2018–2022, MAVA funded a project to address this increasingly common issue: “Mitigating dolphin depredation in Mediterranean fisheries – Joining efforts for strengthening cetacean conservation and sustainable fisheries”. This involved the GFCM along with partners including ACCOBAMS, SPA/RAC, Low Impact Fishers of Europe (LIFE) working across five countries, and built on the progress made in an earlier MAVA-funded project which ran from 2015 to 2018, “Mitigating interactions between endangered marine species and fishing activities”. As with Medbycatch, the goal was to systematically gather data using a standardized protocol to gain a better picture of the situation – when and where interactions occur, how dolphins react to different gear, the full extent of economic losses faced by fishers etc.; and then to explore ways of mitigating it using this new knowledge. 

©GFCM/Claudia Amico 

Fishers’ engagement was again key, and they worked closely with GFCM scientists to test solutions. In Italy, Spain and Malta the focus was on acoustic and visual pingers to deter dolphins from approaching gear (and, in Tunisia, cages on a fish seafarm). In Morocco the project explored the use of stronger purse seiner nets to withstand dolphin attacks. Research work in Italy, meanwhile, saw tests of an alarm to warn fishers of nearby dolphins, giving them time to pull their nets out of the water. 

While none of the solutions are perfect in themselves some are beginning to show real promise, and a mixed approach could be transformative in future – particularly in light of the increased awareness the project has generated, so depredation is now included in regional actions and commitments.  

GFCM-Lex: making legislation transparent and accessible  

In 2019, MAVA funded the creation of GFCM-Lex, the flagship initiative in our project “Towards a region-wide legal framework for the management and conservation of Mediterranean living marine resources and ecosystems”. GFCM-Lex is a multilingual online platform which brings together fisheries and aquaculture legislation from GFCM member countries in a standard, updatable format, to make the information as transparent and accessible as possible – to fishers, fish farmers, administrators, scientists, researchers, lawyers and anyone else with an interest in it. 

In the past, it was not always easy for non-specialists to access information on national legislation on fisheries and aquaculture in the Mediterranean. It was clear that there was a need to create an accessible centralized repository of legislation to overcome this issue, as well as to make it easier to exchange best practices and harmonize regional approaches – and MAVA agreed to back the GFCM’s initiative. 

©GFCM 

Starting with Albania, Algeria, Egypt, Lebanon, Morocco, Tunisia and Türkiye, GFCM-Lex presents national legal profiles in a standardized wiki-style template, in English as well as in the relevant native language. The template is broken down into key areas including access to fisheries resources, conservation and management, monitoring, control and surveillance, and aquaculture-fisheries interactions.  

While the project itself has now come to an end, GFCM-Lex continues to grow, and will ultimately cover all the countries in the GFCM area of application. It will also continue to develop capacity-building initiatives launched by partner organizations at the national and regional levels on subjects such as the fight against illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing, the marine environment and social protection. 

“What’s so important about these three projects is that they built up enough momentum for their activities to continue even when MAVA’s financial involvement ceased,” commented GFCM Executive Secretary Miguel Bernal. “For MAVA, long-term sustainability was always the goal, just as it is here at the GFCM. The Foundation has had a huge impact across the Mediterranean, and we’re proud to be supporting the work started all those years ago by Dr Luc Hoffmann – he was a true visionary in every sense.”