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Fishery management in the Channel of Sicily 427

as employees from the fishing department of the Harbour Office, business advisors to fishing
companies, directors of fishing cooperatives, and the use of direct interviews.

The decision behind using a judgement sample, rather than a random sample, was based on
the need to form a reliable panel and to limit sources of uncertainty which could compromise
the reliability of the results.

Based on the resources available and the survey’s operative requirements, attention was
focused on the most important ports in the Channel of Sicily as regards the various fishing
systems.

Trawling is the most widely used fishing technique used in the Channel of Sicily. The most
important ports for this technique are Mazara del Vallo (151 vessels for a total of 28 055 GT),
Sciacca (85 boats for a total of 4562 GT), and Porto Empedocle (59 boats for a total of
2539 GT). Trawlers from these Sicilian ports catch bottom demersal species in the Channel
(i.e. red shrimp, white shrimp, violet shrimp, and Norway lobster, but also surmullet, hake,
squid, etc.).

Mazara del Vallo is also important for its small-scale-fishery boats (104 vessels equal to
2780 GT) catching mainly demersal coastal species (i.e. hake, red mullet, surmullet, common
pandora, picarel, horned and musky octopus, sagro bream, red porgy, squid, lobster, etc.) by
gillnets, pots, lines, and beach seines.

Small pelagic species (sardine and anchovy) and large pelagic species (in particular bluefin
tuna) are mainly caught by vessels using purse seines from Trapani (17 vessels for a total of
1.318 GT).

Mid-water pair trawl fishing is mostly carried out at Sciacca (10 vessels equal to 492 GT),
the port most well known for oily fish fishing and processing.

Marsala is the Italian most important port for long lining (vessels equal to 1222 GT) for
catching large pelagic species (tuna and swordfish) crossing the Channel.

There were a total of 66 fishing companies involved in the research, of which there were
four from Trapani, nine from Marsala, 27 from Mazara del Vallo, 15 from Sciacca, and 11
from Porto Empedocle. The research method used was that of direct interviews by filling out
questionnaires, designed to supply a report on economic activity for the year 2003 and to
identify the main characteristics of the vessels in use (tonnage, engine capacity, equipment on
board, fishing gear, etc.), of the crew and of the fishing itself.

The data collected were expressed as average data for each boat (x¯), listed with other
variability indices: standard deviation (S) and coefficient of variation (CV).

4.2 Characteristics of the sample companies under analysis

The samples analysed are fairly heterogeneous, as the methods of fishing are different in the
area in question (see table 12). The sample from Trapani (four boats for a total of 322 GT) is
represented by companies with large boats (80.50 GT per vessel) and engine power (319.75 kW
per vessel), in spite of the high variability indices, which employ purse seine fishing with a high
average number of crew (about 11 members). In Marsala (nine boats for a total of 829.26 GT
fishing large deep-sea species with longlines) the average values of tonnage and engine capacity
are also high (92.14 GT and 235.00 kW), but there are fewer fisherman per vessel (around 6).
However, the larger fishing boats, equipped with complex on-board equipment and processing
systems for the catch, are the trawlers from Mazara del Vallo (16 boats equal to 2292.96 GT).
These vessels, due to their large tonnage (143.31 GT per vessel) and engine power (374.06 kW
per vessel), can travel right up to Tunisian and Libyan territorial waters on long fishing trips
that last for approx. 20 d. In Mazara, there is also a sample of smaller boats in terms of capacity