Summary
Historically, EO-based products, with some exceptions like meteorology, have not been widely adopted by the fisheries industry. This is partly due to the EO sector’s lack of experience in fully understanding the specific operational needs of the fisheries industry. Additionally, fisheries stakeholders, including industrial and small-scale operators, regulating bodies, certification entities, NGOs, and insurance companies, have been hesitant to integrate EO-based products into their operations. Fisheries operators typically rely on their own experience and are conservative in changing their methods. Regulating bodies are often reluctant to share catch data, crucial for the validation of EO products, due to privacy and fisheries management concerns.
The DEEPBLUEx2 project aims to develop innovative solutions based in Earth Observation (EO) to support fisheries operations and monitor its environmental impacts. It follows an Agile, user-centered co-design approach with Early Adopters. DEEPBLUEx2 targets four main use cases:
- Route Optimization for Fisheries Operators – Enhancing operational efficiency and safety using EO and Automatic Identification System (AIS) data.
- Safety at Sea for Small-Scale Pelagic Fisheries – Delivering real-time risk scores and incident reporting via mobile apps.
- Reducing Impact from Bycatch Overexploitation – Predictive modeling of bycatch hotspots using EO and historical data.
- Parametric Insurance for Fisheries – Developing EO-based severity and frequency indices to support weather-related insurance schemes.
The DEEPBLUEx2 project is part of the Pioneer Earth Observation apPLications for the Environment (PEOPLE) EO for a Sustainable Blue Economy projects, funded by the Earth Observation Science for Society programmatic element of the ESA FutureEO-1 Segment-2 Programme (2023-2025), specifically in the Fisheries activities.
