Plans for new longliner for the Veruegas Lar fishing company based in Marín promises to break new ground for the Spanish fishing fleet as the first of its kind.
The Ventura project is for a distant waters surface longliner with hybrid propulsion, a battery pack, solar panels and electric deck machinery, as well as a new generation of crew accommodation.
According to Spain’s minister of fisheries Luis Planas, speaking at the event in Brussels, the new vessel is designed to be ‘more environmentally sustainable, with a low carbon footprint, safer, more comfortable, and capable of more selective fishing.’
Designed by naval architect F Carceller, the new 36.50-metre new vessel is to be built by Astilleros Armón for Veruegas Lar, which is run by sisters María José, Mercedes, and Lucía de Pazo Allariz.
Speaking at the event in Brussels, Spanish Director General of Fisheries, Aquaculture, and Technological Innovation Patricia García commented on the need for the Eueopean Commission to provide the resources need to decarbonise fisheries, while current policy is directed more at upgrading new vessels than developing a new generation of more modern and efficient vessels.
Luis Planas reiterated that the European Maritime, Fisheries and Aquaculture Fund (EMFAF) must ‘rise to these challenges.’
He commented that it has to become a more flexible instrument and play a fundamental role in financing both decarbonisation and the development of innovation and sustainable development projects that allow ‘to ensure generational change in a sector that has a future.’
