Stratis Kassos
Mr. Stratis Kassos, a member of the fishing community an important part of the “Fishing For Litter” project, talks about his professional story and his participation in the project. Along with his trawler for more than 30 years, he sailed in the Lemnos, Chios and the Northern Aegean seas, as he removed large amounts of litter from the bottom of the sea.
R: How many years have you worked as a fisherman? When did you start fishing?
SK: I’ve been in the sea, since I was 10 years old and I own my motor trawler for 30 years. I started working as a fisherman because it was my father’s profession.
R: We would like you to describe us a day at sea!
SK: My day begins at the sea and has a lot of stress because our daily wage depends on it. There are some days that work lasts all day long, there’s sleep deprevation and lots of standing. But, there are also the good days, and I’m smiling all day.
R: What differences do you notice regarding the amount of litter in the sea compared to the past?
SK: There are a lot of fishermen at the area that have agreed to remove litter from the sea. At the beginning of this decision, we were taking out larger amounts of litter, but some years later, the quantinty has been minimized due to our collective efforts.
R: What is the strangest type of litter you have removed from the sea?
SK: A big amount of all kinds of barrels.
R: What does the sea and its protection mean to you?
SK: The sea means my whole life. My family survives because of it and we respect it indefinitely. The protection of the sea is something I’m definately interested in because my job and its quality depends on it. If the seas are healthy, then the job quality of a fisherman is healthy.
R: What is the message you would like to pass along the world?
SK: Respect, look after the sea and surely not burden it with our litter.
iSea’s «Fishing For Litter» project is implemented for 6 years in a row, in lots of different areas in Greece, in collaboration with the A C Laskaridis Charitable Foundation. The ambassadors of this project, the professional fishers who actively support the effort of collecting and recording marine litter from the sea all over the country, talk about the nature of their job and share their experience and thoughts about the project.
We would like to thank all the fishers who cooperated with us, for a more effective implementation of the “Fishing For Litter” project and give a personal touch to this effort.