Like many small-scale fishers, Mohammed Barkah often takes photos and videos of the day’s catch off his native Libyan coast. “Have you ever seen this fish?” he asked a small knot of men and women who had crowded around his phone to look at a shiny red fish with a big mouth and hundreds of small black dots.
Forty participants from across the Mediterranean, including fishers, scientists, and other stakeholders, gathered this past November in Gökova Bay, Türkiye, for the Small-scale Fishers’ (SSF) Forum on Non-Indigenous Species (NIS). The General Fisheries Commission for the Mediterranean (GFCM) organized the event with the Mediterranean Conservation Society's (AKD) support. The GFCM works with AKD and fishing cooperatives across the southwest Turkish coast to identify market-based blue economy solutions for NIS species.
The warming waters of the eastern Mediterranean are a hotspot of NIS, including the highly abundant blue crab and lionfish. However, addressing the challenge they pose can also present new opportunities for fishers, who can in turn help to contain the expansion of these species in the region and minimize their potentially negative impacts on ecosystems and, in some cases, on humans.
Akyaka Cooperative, located in Gökova Bay, has developed a successful model for adapting to the changes brought by NIS. The seven no-fishing zones established within the bay’s marine protected area have led to an increase in size and abundance of native species, such as groupers, whose larger bulk and better health allow them to fare better against predation or competition from NIS. Moreover, the Akyaka cooperative offers a profitable outlet for those NIS that are still caught by the fishers working in the MPA. The cooperative sells this catch directly to consumers and local restaurants.
Striking a balance between the conservation of local species and the valorization of NIS for consumption will remain a key priority for AKD, as well as for the GFCM, which has already launched a pilot study on NIS in the eastern Mediterranean and a research programme on blue crab across the entire basin.
“In 2014, when the blue crab started to appear in Tunisian waters, fishers remained helpless. Some fishers actually left their profession for two years”,
Sassi Alaya, a fisher from Tunisia, recalled.
He said that during the high season, the blue crab took over 70 percent of the catch off the Gulf of Gabès in southeast Tunisia. However, when fishers discovered that the crabs have a high market value in Asia and America, a new industry arose around the species, including a processing plant with shore-based jobs. This new fishery also helped to control the rapid growth of blue crabs in the area and reduce its potential impact on local species.
As Mr Alaya was speaking, Ibtissem Gobbaa raised a model crab cage for fishing. The other participants were immediately drawn towards it. The cage eventually made its way around the entire conference room, passing between curious hands, pulling at the ropes and pockets to explore its design.
Tolga Başhan, a representative of the international wholesaler Metro, described initiatives to market lionfish and a growing number of other NIS at the approximately thirty supermarkets his company operates across Türkiye. The company has launched advertising campaigns to promote these species, including free tastings, social media posts, and flyers on supermarket shelves. According to Başhan, part of the challenge is to encourage sustainable consumption habits among customers. This also means educating people on how to cook and eat these new species and integrating them into the diet, thus facilitating their control.
This sense of social responsibility was echoed by Ezgi Yilmaz, a young female chef who presented gourmet lionfish recipes that they have helped make become popular among restaurant-goers in Istanbul.
“I’m happy to do my part and contribute to sustainability through raising awareness about NIS”,
said Yilmaz.
At the end of the three-day workshop, organized in the context of the GEF-funded FishEBM Med project, Houssem Aguibi, the youngest participant at 30 years old, spoke about the benefits of the peer-to-peer regional exchange provided by the SSF Forum:
“In Tunisia, we have a proverb: Do not give me a fish but teach me how to fish. And here I can say that I have learned how to fish these new species.”
By learning how to develop strategies to harvest and commercialize some of these new species, fishers have become one of the most effective means to control and mitigate the impacts they have on local species and ecosystems. Managing these new fisheries, with objectives agreed by all stakeholders, and balancing sustainability at the ecological, economic and social levels is now paramount for both ecosystems and livelihoods, and the GFCM has a key role in addressing this emerging issue.
For more information about the FishEBM Med project, please contact Anna Carlson (Anna.Carlson@fao.org) or visit the project page on iwlearn.net.
© 2026 IW:LEARN
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