Judgement and knowledge in fisheries involving stakeholders (JAKFISH) (38132)

JAKFISH aimed at developing institutions, practices and tools for dealing with scientific support to European Marine policy under high uncertainty.

The objectives of JAKFISH are:
1. to examine and develop these institutions, practices and tools that allow complexity, uncertainty and ambiguity to be dealt with effectively within participatory decision-making processes.
2. to examine how scientific information is used and what types of roles scientists play in the formulation of policies.
3. to study how the current scientific processes take into account the multi-objective nature of fisheries management, and (iv) to synthesize the obtained views and to redefine the institutional role of science in EU polices to improve the overall governance in CFP.


Two parallel tracks were followed:
- First, a number of case studies involving participatory modeling processes with stakeholders involvements were developed, for support in policy decision-making: Western Baltic herring, Central Baltic herring, North Sea nephrops and Mediterranean swordfish.
- Second, sociological analyses of the practices and institutional forms that can most effectively involve the wider community in debates over developing science-based policies were carried in various regions both within Europe (North Sea, Baltic, Mediterranean) and outside (USA, Australia). Ultimately, both tracks were linked into a single synthesis.

The project was coordinated by IMARES, Wageningen UR, The Netherlands.

Research area: Fisheries Management