Plumbing falls of 93% in the production of cockles or 86% in that of fine and slimy clams and losses that, without taking into account inflation, are close to 45 million euros in four years – a third, 15 million, only in 2024—. These are the figures that, with official data in hand, have been presented by the Platform in Defense of the Ría de Arousa (PDRA) and the brotherhoods and groups of mussel producers. Precisely this product, of which Galicia is the second largest producer in the world, suffered in 2023 the worst year in its history. A debacle similar to that suffered by octopus catches, in this case, along the entire coastline. Parliament has just unanimously requested from the Xunta a recovery plan for the cephalopod. That is what the sector demands, urgently and specifically, for the largest of the Galician estuaries.
The PDRA extracted the bivalve production data in Arousa from the autonomous administration’s own technological platform, Pescadegalicia.gal. From them it is deduced, for example, that the fine clam went from an average production of 329 tons per year between 2002 and 2022, remaining at 155 t/a from 2019 to 2023 to plummet in 2024 to 21 tons, a drop of 86.5% compared to the previous four-year period. According to the shellfish harvesters, since 2013, their presence in the estuary has only decreased.
The most abundant slimy clam began to decline in 2015. In 2024, 38 t were collected, 85.8% below the 2019-23 average, which was 268 t/a, half of the 2002-22 period, when 556 t/a were reached. The blonde clam was reduced by half last year, when 75 tons were collected, while the japonica, “a foreign species more resistant to adverse conditions,” fell by 41% to 901 tons. The biggest drop is that of the cockle, already at its lowest levels since 2008 “despite a slight recovery in 2022.” The 19 tons represent a decline of 93.7% compared to the 300 in the 2019-2023 period and an abyss compared to the 716 on average between 2002 and 2022.
As a whole, the total production of bivalves in the estuary—not counting the port of Carril—is almost 45% in 2024 compared to the previous five years: 1,166 tons compared to 2,572. Translated into money, global sales in all the markets of the estuary add up to economic losses of 16.2 million euros compared to the previous five years—69 million euros compared to 85.2—, of which practically all are due to the fall of bivalves, which fell by exactly half: 14.7 million euros.
This represents a loss of 10,259 euros for each active fishing permit during 2024. In January of that year, there were 1,540 active permex, 146 less than in 2019 and almost 200 below those existing in 2011. Without counting inflation, the Losses since 2021 in the estuary reach 44.6 million euros.
The fear of the “privatization of shellfish harvesting”
For the PDRA, the figures demonstrate the “progressive deterioration” of the estuary that they have been warning about for “many years” and which is reflected “in the loss of tons of bivalves, millions of euros, permits and the lack of recovery capacity.” of the shellfish banks.”
They demand “human, economic and technological” resources from the the estuary “The lower rate of water renewal causes a greater impact of pollution from WWTPs and discharges from factories.” They want the administration to recognize the problem and take real “non-propaganda” action. “In this case, the patches are not worth it, they only prolong the agony,” they said in reference to the “precarious” aid from the Xunta.
They consider “urgent” a plan for the regeneration of the shellfish beds and a comprehensive sanitation plan for the estuary and rivers, in addition to paralyzing both the Touro mine and the Altri macrocellulose project in Palas de Rei, which plans to capture every day 46 million liters of water from the Ulla and return 30 million liters to their course, once “treated”.
“If we continue as before, many people will continue to abandon sea activity and the brotherhoods that depend on shellfish fishing will close. In the medium term, the concessions will be lost and, finally, the Xunta will be able to introduce industrial aquaculture in the marine space of the estuaries to replace traditional farming,” concludes the PDRA, “because the Xunta is taking the necessary steps so that shellfishing is viable.” The “privatization of shellfish farming” that the brotherhoods fear so much.
In this context, the refusal of the PP to support the popular legislative initiative for the protection of fishing, shellfish and mussels – the popular ones even vetoed its debate in Parliament -, together with the declaration as “strategic projects” of the mine of Touro and macrocellulose “are political decisions against the sector, because they are going to throw people out of the sea.”

The worst mussel year in a quarter of a century
The figures published by the PDRA complement the latest and alarming mussel statistics. Raised in trays, compared to clams or cockles that are collected in the sand, Galicia is the second world producer of this bivalve, only behind China, and the Arousa estuary is its main cultivation center.
In 2023—the data for 2024 is not yet public—178,065 tons were collected in the community, which producers sold for less than 120 million euros. This figure was the lowest in the last 25 years and was a complete setback compared to the great result of 2022, when 220 tons were reached and sales in port exceeded 150 million euros, 20% more.
Two thirds of the total, 121 thousand tons, were collected in the Arousa estuary, in the so-called Maritime Province of Vilagarcía. Half left the districts of A Pobra do Caramiñal (36 thousand tons) and Cambados (30 thousand).
The causes of the decline were multiple. The most visible, the cheek crunch, the mussel seed that the shellfish hunters obtain on the rocks they share with the barnacles. A territorial conflict between both sectors ended with protests in front of the Xunta headquarters and police charges.
The deepest, and which threatens to continue, is the decline of the outcrops, the entry of cold currents from the Atlantic that renew the water of the estuary and its nutrients. In 2023, its decrease caused a rise in sea temperature that, in addition to killing many specimens, affected spawning cycles and slowed down their growth.
Answers for the octopus
Beyond the Arousa estuary, another emblematic product of Galician gastronomy, the octopus, continues in free fall. Five years after what was considered the worst campaign in history, that of 2020, the red warning lights turn on again. Then, the number of catches had fallen by half: just over a thousand tons compared to 2,130 in 2019. The campaign had been preceded by a single month of closure, compared to the usual two, and this was noticed.
The biological stoppage was extended to nine weeks – later it would be reduced to six – but it seemed enough to begin a recovery path that, in 2022, left a maximum of 2,260 tons. After touching 2,000 the following year, in 2024 it returned to a minimum: 1,183 tons.
With this data in hand, all the forces of the Galician Parliament unanimously supported a proposal from the BNG to request studies from the Xunta, aid to maintain a broader ban and recovery measures to address the shortage of octopus. It was the second time that this happened, which is why the nationalists have asked the Galician government for “effective measures.”
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