The paramount importance of fish, and Greece’s failed conservation efforts

A new proposal to create marine parks agrees with stated government policy, and could actually bring it to pass

Divers monitoring the Gyaros marine park. The building in the background was once an incarceration camp for communists (Courtesy WWF)

Prime minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis is in receipt of a proposal to create a string of scuba diving parks along Greece’s biologically rich coastline.

Five weeks ago, Pristine Seas, the marine research branch of National Geographic, put it in his hands, and a week ago, Enric Sala, the founder of Pristine Seas, went public.

According to the Pristine Seas proposal, seen by Hellenica, investing €65mn initially and 55mn a year to increase the number of scuba parks from the current 124 would quadruple income from scuba diving to over €300mn a year. Given VAT of 24 percent on services, the government should be interested.

But scuba is only the bait to catch an income-sensitive premier on the lookout for new industries. Pristine Seas’ real agenda is to use such parks as marine preserves that would allow fisheries to recover and biodiversity to thrive.

According to the Hellenic Statistical Service, Greek fishing fleets produced 65mn tonnes of fish in 2022, less than three quarters the annual catch at the turn of the century (ca 90mn tonnes). As a result, income from fishing has remained stagnant, at about a quarter of a billion euros. Factoring in inflation since the inception of the euro, it has fallen by €150mn, or 37 percent. Boosting real income from fishing is the second bait for prime minister Mitsotakis and his finance minister, ever-solicitous of our primary surplus.