The Government will expand the Freus Marine Reserve by 5,600 hectares.

PalmThe Government, at the suggestion of the sector and the Formentera Council, will expand the Freus Marine Reserve by 5,600 hectares and join it with the Punta de la Cruz reserve. With this expansion, the reserve's total area would increase from 15,500 hectares to 21,190.

In addition, he emphasized that the intention is to submit the proposal for public comment during the last week of July and in September submit it to the mandatory Balearic Islands advisory bodies for their regulatory opinion. Thus, it is expected that the expansion could be officially approved before the end of the year. The proposal will include the monitoring of fish populations in the two marine reserves, as well as the analysis of data from the green boxes. general stock and at control points compared to the first census, carried out in May 2000.

As for commercial fish biomass, increases are 700% in the total stock (13.3 kg/250 m²); 500% in the partial stock (10.8 kg/0) (4.2 kg/250 m²).

"Currently, the biomass in the partial reserve is double that of the control zones open to fishing, while in the integral reserve it is triple, taking into account that the biomass in the zones open to fishing has tripled in the last 25 years. The results are spectacular.

In relation to the monitoring of regulated activities in the reserves, data on recreational fishing and diving have been presented, although diving is only practiced in the Freus. Rock fishing predominates.

Diving in the Freus, moreover, maintains a stable trend year after year, with 13,079 dives recorded during the last year, concentrated mainly in Punta Gavina, the Platform and the Daus in the strict

The Marilles Foundation has positively assessed the expansion of the Freus de Ibiza and Formentera marine reserve of fishing interest, but has encouraged the Government to go further and move forward with its pending tasks. "We must take advantage of this opportunity to also expand the strict protection zone ("integral reserve") of this reserve, that is, the area where fishing is completely prohibited. This measure, accompanied by sound participatory management by all stakeholders, would help recover the fish populations and biodiversity of this protected marine area in year 9."

The data, the foundation emphasizes, which the Government has made public, demonstrate the benefits of strict protection. "The integral reserve area of this reserve has between three and four times more fish than outside the reserve and much more than in the part of the reserve where fishing occurs," it notes. Thus, they explain that the data also show that there is almost twice the diversity within the integral reserve than outside the reserve. All of this "demonstrates the need to expand the comprehensive reserves not only in this reserve but also in the Balearic Islands," he states.