A common methodology towards the development of an integrated fisheries management approach for the Mediterranean and Black Sea regions has been developed leading to the establishment of the Vessel Monitoring System Geoportal.

PERSEUS Project has carried out this work, and all the EU regions working in the area of Southern European Seas can benefit from it.
PERSEUS scientists formulated a common methodology, to analyse Vessel Monitoring System (VMS) data, and developed a web based GIS platform to visualize the results of the analysis for the estimation of fishing effort.

By using simple tools and equipment already available and mandated by existing EU legislation any European region can now set up a system to assess the fishing effort and fishing activity on the fishing grounds for specific species for managing European fishing fleets and for conserving fish stocks.

By this PERSEUS helps policy decision making in relation to fisheries by providing estimates of catch, location, pressure, etc. from existing and collectable data for managing European fishing fleets and for conserving fish stocks.

The PERSEUS Vessel Monitoring System (VMS) geoportal is available online at http://artemis2.ath.hcmr.gr/ and detailing common data approaches. The methodology supports and enhances the work of existing in-port manual fishing catch checks.