The Shipyard of Koufonisi [το καρνάγιο του Κουφονησίου]
The Aegean Archipelago was once full of shipyards and ship carpenters, building and repairing the countless wooden caïques that have been crossing the Mediterranean and the seas of the Levant since prehistory. The once omnipresent traditional wooden and wind-powered vessels have been now-a-days replaced by plastic speedboats, powered by polluting internal combustion diesel engines. Yet, in Greece one can still find a significant number of wooden traditional vessels, the caïques, mostly surviving as small scale fishing boats.
With thousands of islands and islets and more than 15,000 kilometres of coastline, Greece is the absolute maritime country. No local, nor a visitor can envisage the small insular and coastal communities in Greece without the ubiquitous, colourful, wooden fishing boats, manned by sunburned and seasoned fishers. Besides, the Greek fishing fleet currently (2022) consists of more than 14,000 fishing vessels, the largest fleet by numbers in EU. However, most fishing boats are of reduced capacity and power, below 10 meters of length, and build of wood, as traditional caïques.
Alas, in this day and age, this ancient profession of ship carpenter will probably become extinct, while most of the traditional wood-shipyards are vanishing from the islands, replaced by modern and more profitable tourism related financial businesses. Over and above, the wooden traditional fishing caïques in Greece are literally under persecution, due to the EU Common Fisheries Policy, which is rightfully aiming to reduce the grave and seriously negative impacts of fisheries to the marine ecosystems and fish-stocks. In fact, an EU supported measure for achieving the latter objectives provides important financial subsidies to fishers that permanently cease their professional fishing activities. In order to certify the cessation and claim the subsidy from the European Maritime and Fisheries Fund (currently EMFAF), the fisher is required to tear down and scrap his fishing vessel, thus often leading to the loss of a unique and wonderful craft, never to be build again. Hopefully, a strong movement with reaching awareness campaigns has been built up to sensitise fishers and authorities for the paramount value of wooden fishing caïques and to seek their preservation as important and protected elements of the Greek and Mediterranean cultural identity.
This post and its photography has been shot in Pano Koufonisi [Πάνω Κουφονήσι], a small island laying to the SE of Naxos, famous for its sandy beaches and its tough and numerous small scale fishing community. The island is inhabited by skilful seafarers and veteran fishers, its community is heavily dependent on fishery, while only the very few recent decades, a steep and torrential turn towards tourism is observed. Despite its small size, Pano Koufonisi hosts the last traditional wood-shipyard in this part of the Aegean Archipelago, which serves a significant amount of small scale fishers and wooden craft owners from the neighbouring islands. Unfortunately, the survival of this small shipyard is not secured for the future, despite the efforts of the local community, the small scale fishers from the island and beyond, and the local municipal and regional authorities. Hopefully, the Ministry of Culture may accept a formal request by the Municipal Authority of Naxos and Small Cyclades (to which Pano Koufonisi belongs to) to declare the shipyard as a Modern Monument, thus ensuring its operation for the future and preserving an activity that may become extinct very soon from our modern society.
