Creating new income opportunity for local fishing communities in Turkey
On World Tourism Day (27 September), pescatourism tours started in Turkey’s Gökova Bay as part of FAO’s Blue Hope Initiative in the Mediterranean Sea. This is a major step in adapting pescatourism in the country, which aims to reduce the fishing effort on stocks and create new income opportunity for the local communities by offering revenue from other uses of their vessel.
“Pressure on stocks has drastically increased in the Mediterranean, and also in Turkey, and there is an urgent need to create alternative livelihood opportunities to keep alive the traditional, small-scale fisheries and also attract the young generation to the sector,” said Disa Vurdem, FAO fisheries specialist and coordinator of the project. “The pilot tours will operate until the end of November and we do hope it will further trigger the process of full legalization of this activity in Turkey.”
In Turkey, the interest for adopting pescatourism – traditional fishing tourism – emerged in 2019 and soon received full support from the project’s stakeholders. The idea was to pilot traditional fishing tours in Gökova Bay, the project area, and understand the interest on such alternative livelihood diversification from both fishers and potential tourists.
Simultaneously, upon request from the Turkish Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry represented, FAO has also been supporting the country in preparing the legal roadmap for the most suitable pescatourism model.
The tours were launched through a joint event of FAO, the Mediterranean Conservation Society, and the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry, with participation by relevant partners, including the Ministry of Transport and Infrastructure, Coast Guard, Ege University, Central Union of Fishery Cooperatives, representatives from fishery cooperatives of the region, World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF), and local NGOs. The objective of the meeting was to inform participants on the progress made in the preparation of the legal framework and foster discussion on detalization of this activity in terms of vessel eligibility, safety requirements, hygiene standards, and insurance aspects.
“This opportunity is one the last manoeuvres for creating alternative livelihoods for the fishing communities and releasing the pressure on heavily depleted stocks,” President of the Mediterranean Conservation Society, Zafer Kızılkaya, said when opening the event.
This FAO Technical Cooperation Programme aims to support the governments, key institutions, and other partners in Turkey, Algeria, and Tunisia in developing and implementing integrated, multi-sectoral tools and investment programmes using the FAO Blue Growth Initiative framework. The ultimate goal is to make these sectors more productive and sustainable and the associated value chains more efficient and inclusive, and reduce rural poverty. Strengthening the capacity of these countries to implement Blue Growth tools will also put them in a position to solicit additional funding and investment from different institutions, which have Blue Growth-focused investment priority areas.
22 October 2021, Muğla, Turkey