Fincantieri and Federpesca (the Italian National Association of Fishing Enterprises) signed a Memorandum of Understanding to promote the renewal of the Italian fishing fleet, the company said in its release.
Fincantieri will be the project leader within the aforementioned partnership, which will also be open to other selected businesses of the industry. The Group will identify some standards of the fishing vessels specifically intended for the Italian fishing industry, leveraging on the expertise gained by its subsidiary Vard through the construction of special vessels for the advanced aquaculture cluster in Norway.
The vessels will be equipped with cutting-edge solutions, notably in terms of decarbonization and digitalization. Moreover, thanks to the Group’s ability to integrate each contribution of its several expertise centers, the project will enhance the technological systems and components developed by Fincantieri and its subsidiaries.
Federpesca will promote and support the project by representing the fishing enterprises in front of all the relevant national and international institutions providing a comprehensive overview of the fishery market. The Association will also be involved in setting out the technical specifications required by the sector by coordinating the suggestions and requests coming from the industry, as well as being in charge of scouting new potential markets in the Mediterranean area.
There is a need to re-launch the sector, having the Italian fishing fleet dwindled significantly over the past decades. It currently consists of roughly 12,000 motor trawlers, accounting for 17% of the EU fleet and employing 25,000 people. Furthermore, the Italian fishing fleet results to be the most outdated and lagging behind, in terms of competitiveness (average fishing vessel age is 31 years), among the other EU countries, with a growing trend of per-capita consumption of fish products in the EU market, and especially in the Italian one. A thorough upgrade of the fishing fleet is therefore essential to bridge the gaps that prevent to meet domestic demand (Italy is self-sufficient by 15% at most), and in turn affect the environment, the quality and cost of production, onboard working and safety conditions, and the competitiveness and sustainability of the entire system.