A semi-automatic system for labelling seafood products and obtaining fishery management data: A case study of the bottom trawl fishery in the central Mediterranean Sea

Abstract

This study is on the implementation of a semi-automatic labelling system (LS) of the Mediterranean Sea
seafood harvest to address the increased need for seafood authentication and inherent difficulties of
commonly used indirect techniques for estimating fisheries yield and fishing effort. Sensitive data required for
anti-counterfeit policies, such as date and catch area, can be acquired and recorded on the label by userfriendly automated software that excludes any possible manipulation by the crew. Based on results obtained
from the installation of the LS on bottom commercial trawlers, the system certified the origin of the seafood
products and simultaneously provided, indirectly, geospatial fisheries yield and fishing effort data of the main
exploited species.