Past, present, and future of the maritime Socotra: sustainable fishing tourism perspectives.

The Socotra Archipelago is universally renown because of its biodiversity, nonetheless the cultural heritage – such as the centuries-old culture of small fishing communities – is not of minor importance. Even though Socotra Island is still hardly accessible to mass tourism, the number of tourists visiting it has been increasing and fishing tourism is growing, attracting amateurs and professionals from all over the world. Our research, based on semi-structured interviews and observation during fieldwork, aims at investigating if and how tradition-based fishing tourism could be a source for extra income for fishermen of Socotra and at the same time how it could incentivize sustainable tourism development on the island. The paper analyses fishermen’s tangible and intangible heritage, as well as the current fishing tourism offer in order to outline a concrete proposal of community-based tourism.