Conservation charity Ghost Fishing UK (GFUK) has won the Sustainability Award at the 2022 Fishing News Awards, in recognition of the charity’s work to remove abandoned, lost and discarded fishing gear (ALDFG) – also known as ‘ghost gear’ – from the UK’s waters.
Winners of the awards are selected by a panel of industry judges for demonstrating a unique and innovative response to an issue of environmental sustainability within the UK and Irish fishing industries. Nominees must demonstrate that their project has gone above and beyond standard practice, and provide supporting evidence of its impact. The judges look particularly for projects that have influenced a significant change in behaviour, and inspired broader awareness or engagement.
Ghost Fishing UK was founded in 2015 to train volunteer scuba divers to survey and recover lost fishing gear, with the aim of either returning it to the fishing industry or recycling it. The Fishing News Sustainability Award follows on from the charity’s 2021 success winning the Best Plastic Campaign at the Plastic Free Awards, something the team thinks of as a ‘unique achievement’.
‘We have always held the belief that working with the fishing industry is far more productive than being against it, in terms of achieving our goals to reduce and remove lost fishing gear,’ said Ghost Fishing trustee, Christine Grosart. ‘The positive response to our fisheries reporting system that we received from both the fishing industry and the marine environment sector, was evidence that working together delivers results.
‘The feedback we got from the awards evening was that the fishing industry despises lost fishing gear as much as we do and the fishers here are very rarely at fault,’ Ms Grosart continued. ‘It is costly to them to lose gear and they will make every effort to get it back, but sometimes they can’t. That is where we come in, to try to help. Everyone wins, most of all the environment. You can’t ask for much more.’
‘It was awesome to meet such a variety of different people throughout the industry, who are all looking at different ways of improving the sustainability and reduction of the environmental impact of the fishing industry,’ said GFUK Operations Officer, Fred Nunn, who drove from Cornwall to Aberdeen to attend the event. ‘It was exciting to have so many people from the fishing industry approaching us to find out more about what we do, but also what they could offer.
‘Fishermen came to us with reports and offers of help using their vessels,’ continued Nunn, ‘and other exhibitors tried to find ways that their product or service could assist in our mission.’
Ghost Fishing UK relies on reports of lost fishing gear from the scuba diving and commercial fishing communities, and to date has received more than 200 reports. The team has conducted more than 150 survey and ghost gear recovery dives, amounting to over 1000 individual dives and diver hours by Ghost Fishing UK’s volunteers.
Chair of Ghost Fishing UK and technical diving instructor Richard Walker said he was ‘immensely proud’ of the team’s achievements. ‘I’ve been a scuba diver since 1991 and have met thousands of divers in that time. I’d be hard pushed to think of one of them that wasn’t concerned about conservation of our marine environment,’ he said.
‘To be recognised by the fishing industry for our efforts in sustainability is a huge honour for us, and has encouraged our team to work even harder to find, survey and remove lost fishing gear from the seas,’ said Walker. ‘The fact that the fishing industry recognises our efforts, and appreciates our stance as a group that wants to work alongside them is one of the highlights of our charity’s history, and we look forward to building the relationship further.’
For more from Ghost Fishing UK and to report a ghost gear sighting, head to www.ghostfishing.co.uk. You can also follow the team on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube.
