The Projeto Pesca has as main objective to build, together with fisher from the community of Torres and Passo de Torres, southern Brazil, marine conservation strategies, socio-cultural valorization and fisheries management. The aim is to develop measures that make the fishing activity sustainable, in order to guarantee the long-term maintenance not only of the exploited fishing resources, but also threatened species’ populations, including the franciscana.
Interactions between fishing activities and non-target species occur worldwide, with operational interaction with fishing nets having the greatest impact on many populations of cetaceans, turtles and sea birds, and elasmobranchs. The franciscana, the species that symbolizes all endangered species in the project's logo, is considered the most endangered dolphin in the Western South Atlantic Ocean, mainly due to the mortality resulting from bycatch. Thus, strategies aimed at the sustainability of fishing must include a reduction in the mortality of non-target species due to bycatch.
Our activities include monitoring fishing operations with onboard observers, conducting interviews with fisher and capacity building of young people from the fishing community of Torres and Passo de Torres. Experiments aimed at reducing bycatch events using low-cost equipment have been carried out.
In the project logo, sinuous shapes represent the waves, which involve the target species of fishing and move the vessel and porpoise, bringing their sense of dependence on other species that move in tune with the sea. Anchored in art, it is intended to contribute to the production of technical and scientific knowledge for fisheries management and to promote behavior change of different stakeholders of the fishing chain, especially fisher.
