ByElasmoCatch Egypt

Fisheries in Egypt play a crucial role on supporting the local live hoods, supporting more than 250,000 fishers. The Mediterranean coast of Egypt is approximately 950 km, where according to the latest report by the GFCM is consisted by a fleet of 3,405 vessels. Mediterranean is impacted by overexploitation and habitat degradation, contributing negatively to the fishing sector. This is also the case for Egyptian fisheries and are further affected by the lack of regulatory enforcement. Among the most vulnerable species affected by fishing pressure in Egypt are sharks and rays. Most elasmobranchs are recorded under broad categories such as “sharks,” “rays,” or “cartilaginous fishes,” with fewer than 25 percent identified to the genus level. Without targeted and coordinated interventions, Egypt risks significant losses in marine biodiversity and may jeopardize the sustainability of one of its most ecologically and historically valuable marine regions. This project is a collaborative initiative focusing on monitoring shark fisheries using ByElasmoCatch protocols for landing sites across major fishing ports that the two entities will collect standardised, comparable data on elasmobranch species diversity, preliminary bycatch data and biological data, paving the road for science-based conservation of sharks and rays in Egypt.