Page 112 - KATE_JOHNSTON_2017

knowledge’ (Berke in Begossi & Silvano 2005, p. 44). It is knowledge that small populations

use, which employs simple technologies, as they relate to their natural environment (Ståle

2008, p. 30). As I will discuss in chapters four, five and six, the socio-technical configuration

of the tonnara is not so simple, and challenges the argument upon which traditional/local

knowledge is based.

Aside from traditional and local, the interrelated terminology for fisheries, evident in

in ocean policy, campaigns, and eco-product advertising, is small-scale and artisan. Although

not directly talking about knowledge, these terms express many of the same ideas. The FAO

(1999, p. 105) has identified artisanal fisheries as:

[T]raditional fisheries involving fishing households (as opposed to commercial
companies), using relatively small amount of capital and energy, relatively small
fishing vessels (if any), making short fishing trips, close to shore, mainly for local
consumption. In practice, definition varies between countries, e.g. from gleaning
or a one-man canoe in poor developing countries, to more than 20-m. trawlers,
seiners, or long-liners in developed ones. Artisanal fisheries can be subsistence or
commercial fisheries, providing for local consumption or export. They are
sometimes referred to as small-scale fisheries.

This quote demonstrates the broad definition of an artisan fishery. Other less ambiguous

discussions clearly situate artisan and small–scale in opposition to industrial fisheries,

highlighting the lighter environmental impact of these fisheries. For example, Paolo Giudetti

and the fishermen of Torre Guaceto at the 2012 Meeting of Artisan Fishermen and Marine

Protected Areas of the Mediterranean, suggest that:

[a]rtisan fishing is different from industrial fishing: it too impacts on the
environment but its impact can be controlled and is far less significant than the
impact of industrial fishing. (in Piante 2012, n.p.)

100