Cultural Seascapes in the ‘Sea of Calms’ and La Restinga Coast
- Authors: De la Cruz-Modino, Raquel , Piñeiro-Corbeira, Cristina , Aswani, Shankar , González-Cruz, Carla , Domínguez, David , Ordóñez García, Paula , Santana-Talavera, Agustín , Pascual-Fernández, José
- Date: 2022
- Subjects: To be catalogued
- Language: English
- Type: text , book
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/391319 , vital:68641 , ISBN 978-3-031-07289-5 , https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-07289-5
- Description: El Hierro has been characterized by the balance between human development and environmental sustainability. The island was historically far from the mass tourism developments dominant on the other Canary Islands. Tourism accommodations in El Hierro are few compared to more developed coastal areas in the Archipelago, and recreational activities are mainly linked to cultural and natural sites and resources. This chapter focuses on La Restinga fishing village and its coasts, where the ‘Sea of Calms’ and one multiple-use Marine Reserve (MR) are located, both of which became popular over the last decade. The tourist development experience has promoted a new way of looking at the sea and conceptualizing its habitats and populations. In 2014, after the submarine volcano eruption occurred in 2011, we estimated that at least 25,391 dives had been carried out in the diving spots established by the MR and other diving sites close to La Restinga. Despite the difficulties experienced after the volcano eruption, a unique imaginaire has been consolidated, thanks to the image of the island's exclusive nature and iconic elements. In addition, the rapid recovery of the destination is an excellent example of how the tourism system can adapt and incorporate unexpected events such as volcanic eruptions.
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- Date Issued: 2022
Small but strong: Socioeconomic and ecological resilience of a small European fishing community affected by a submarine volcanic eruption
- Authors: De la Cruz-Modino, Raquel , Piñeiro-Corbeira, Cristina , Gutiérrez-Barroso, Josué , González-Cruz, Carla , Barreiro, Rodolfo , Batista-Medina, José A , Pascual-Fernández, José , González, José A , Santana-Talavera, Agustín , Aswani, Shankar
- Date: 2022
- Subjects: To be catalogued
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/391397 , vital:68648 , xlink:href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ocecoaman.2022.106124"
- Description: Small-scale coastal fishing communities are facing many new challenges, such as rapid ecological changes created by anthropogenic and natural events like earthquakes or volcanic eruptions. This paper explores how a coastal population has responded to such an event and highlights the diverse coping strategies used to tackle it. This research was conducted on the island of El Hierro (Spain), where a submarine volcanic eruption occurred in 2011, affecting a multiple-use Marine Protected Area (MPA) and the nearby fishing community of La Restinga. Our study illustrates how the local population coped with this situation by combining multiple monetary and non-monetary activities (e.g., informal exchanges) as well as the role of institutions in increasing local resilience by supporting fishers' demands and allowing their participation in the decision-making process in the immediate wake of a catastrophic event. Local families also exploited various natural resources in and near the MPA, thus ensuring access to crucial marine resources and continued recreational/cultural services. The results suggest that collective action played a key role in the recovery process after the eruption, creating some advantages for different local groups despite the hazardous nature of the event.
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- Date Issued: 2022