Available online at www.sciencedirect.com Fisheries Research 91 (2008) 222–238 Multidimensional and intertemporal sustainability assessment: A case study of the Basque trawl fisheries A. Murillas a,∗ , R. Prellezo a , E. Garmendia b,c , M. Escapa b,d , C. Gallastegui b,d , A. Ansuategi d a AZTI, Technological Institute for Fisheries and Food, Department of Fisheries Resources, Txatxarramendi Ugartea z/g, 48395 Sukarrieta, Spain b IEP, Instituto de Econom´ ıa P ´ ublica, University of the Basque Country, Spain c ICTA Institute for Environmental Sciences and Technologies (ICTA), Universitat Autonoma de Barcelona, Spain d Dpto Fundamentos del An ´ alisis Econ ´ omico I, University of the Basque Country, Spain Received 16 February 2007; received in revised form 22 November 2007; accepted 30 November 2007 Abstract The aim of this paper is to analyse the sustainability of fisheries exploitation through taking into account both the multidisciplinary and intertem- poral dimension of the Basque trawl fisheries. The Rapfish methodology is used for the analysis of the ecological, economic and technological sustainability of the Basque trawl fisheries between 1992 and 2003. In accordance with what has been observed in other Rapfish studies, the analysis shows that the contribution towards sustainability depends on many different attributes. Moreover, given that the results obtained are consistent with what other bioeconomic models predict, the technique is postulated as a complementary tool for defining justifiable policy recommendations and fishery management options. © 2007 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. Keywords: Integrated assessment; Fishing resources; Intertemporal sustainability; Rapfish 1. Introduction Sustainability in the fisheries sector is undoubtedly accepted as a desirable aim. The questions are then, how to define sustainability and how to measure progress towards that. Cur- rently one of the main goals of the Common Fisheries Policy (CFP) in the European Union is to assure the long-term sustainability of fish stocks by preventing the overexploita- tion of the resource by the fishing industry. Overfishing has become one of the main threats to modern fisheries and it is known that many stocks in European Union waters are now below their safe biological thresholds. The CFP promotes sustainability through implementing various stock conserva- tion measures. These include setting targets for total allowable catch (TAC), and total allowable effort (TAE) as well as enforcing technical measures such as closed areas and mesh sizes. ∗ Corresponding author. Tel.: +34 946029400; fax: +34 946870006. E-mail address: amurillas@suk.azti.es (A. Murillas). In addition to the pressure placed on fish stocks from the high fishing effort, other factors such as biological uncer- tainty, socio-economic issues and technological developments may also threaten the sustainability of fisheries worldwide. In this sense, Garc´ ıa and Staples (2000) state that “sustainability requires explicitly that both the conditions of the ecosystem and the people living in it are either good or improving as a conse- quence of an action”. Thus, in order to assess the sustainability of fisheries, it is necessary to integrate data from various dis- ciplines such as economics, sociology and ecology. This data can be both quantitative and qualitative. Under this premise one multidisciplinary approach to sustainability is through the use of Rapfish, a non-parametric evaluation methodology, developed by the Fisheries Centre at the University of British Columbia, Canada. Rapfish uses simple and easily scored attributes to provide a rapid, cost-effective, and multidisciplinary appraisal of the sta- tus of a fishery, in terms of comparative levels of sustainability (Preikshot et al., 1998). It has been used to compare the sustain- ability status of many fisheries (Alder et al., 2000; Baeta et al., 2005; Preikshot et al., 1998; Tesfamichael and Pitcher, 2006). 0165-7836/$ – see front matter © 2007 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.fishres.2007.11.030