Development of Fisheries and Aquaculture in Albania

Albania has great natural and infrastructure resources for the development of fisheries and aquaculture sector, commerce and industry of fishery processing products etc. So Albania has a coastline of about 474 km long, an extensive network of hydrograph. It ranks in the first countries in Europe in terms of water resources. The hydrographic basin of Albania has an area of 43 300 km² or 57% more than the territory of the state of our country and 50.000 km rivers and streams, 1,100 km² surface of lake water and sufficient artificial reservoirs. In this article all these resources will be analyzed in detail; it will be also analyzed the identification and further development of these resources, which have special importance in building strategies and policies in the direction of further development of this sector aiming at increasing production, paying attention to the sustainable use of these resources without damage on the biodiversity and the environment. Research in this field is carried out mainly by universities, mostly from the Agricultural University of Tirana. The Ministry of Agriculture in collaboration with Ministry of Environment Forests and Water Administration, has played an important role in constructing strategies for the development of this sector as well as commerce and industry of fishery products processing through projects MEDITS and AdriaMed where an important place has the study of ecological and environmental effects, mainly in the lagoons in cases of fishing beyond manufacturing capacity. Very important are also the infrastructure and human resources, which give weight to the development of this sector. In this country there are 4 ports that develop fishing activities, where the most important is the largest port in the country, the port of Durres. Social effects of the development of this sector are also important in studies, mainly in terms of employment and community consumption per habitants, which is 3.3 kg / year of about 15 kg / year consumed by the countries of the Mediterranean region. At the end of this paper we will list some premises development of this sector, recognizing it as an important output sector with great impact in the economic and social life in the country. Keywords: Fishing, Infrastructure, Water Resources, Sustainable Development