Social

Under the provisions of Council Regulation 2017/1004, we are requesting social variables on the EU fishing, aquaculture and fish processing sectors. In particular, employment by gender, age, education, nationality, and employment status; FTEs by gender, and Unpaid labour by gender, for the fishing and aquaculture sectors, as detailed in Table 9 of the Commission Delegated Decision (EU) 2021/1167. While for the countries involved in the fish processing sector data collection, the variables to be reported are: Employment by gender, age, education, and nationality; and FTEs by gender, detailed in Table 10 of the Commission Delegated Decision (EU) 2019/910.
Member States are also invited to submit listed data following aquaculture segmentation.

Period

opening:	legal deadline:	operational deadline:	database closure:
25 August 2025	25 September 2025	08 October 2025	15 October 2025

Official communication

Templates

To be able to upload data you need to use files with a specific structure. The files can be downloaded all at once [here] or one by one from the table below:

data on aquaculture:	base fleet segment data:	data on processing:
social_aqua	social_fleet	social_proind

(last update: 25 August 2025)

Important notes

The upload tool accepts only Excel files with a specific format, as they are provided:
- do not change the headers (names and order of columns);
- do not change the sheet's name;
- the file's name must start with the one provided, any string can be added after provided file name; for example: social_fleet_2018 or social_fleet_JRC are accepted but not JRC_social_fleet;
- no macros and no calculation fields are allowed;
- data are considered well received if in the upload status is reported "File successfully uploaded".
If you need to change or delete values in year X, you need to reupload all the valid values for year X. The system will substitute the new list with the old one for a given year. Changes are executed by year.
It is recommended to upload template's data by year, it will facilitate the detection of errors if any.

Upload and Check

uploading:	checking:
upload tool _{^{(database storage, final data)}}	check the data _{^{(refreshed once a day)}}

Mandatory variables

templates	mandatory variables
social_aqua	A) Acronym, B) Value, C) Unit, D) Year : are mandatory in all rows, K) Gender, L) Age, M) Education, N) Nationality, O) Employment_status : at least one from K-O must be present in each row, cross-tabulation is preferred (e.g. Value by Gender, Age, Education, etc. combined). Over the full dataset, all variables K–O should be represented.
social_fleet	A) Acronym, B) Value, C) Unit, D) Year : are mandatory in all rows, N) Gender, O) Age, P) Education, Q) Nationality, R) Employment_status : at least one from N-R must be present in each row, cross-tabulation is preferred (e.g. Value by Gender, Age, Education, etc. combined). Over the full dataset, all variables N–R should be represented.
social_proind	A) Acronym, B) Value, C) Unit, D) Year : are mandatory in all rows, H) Gender, I) Age, J) Education, K) Nationality : at least one from H-K must be present in each row, cross-tabulation is preferred (e.g. Value by Gender, Age, Education, etc. combined). Over the full dataset, all variables H–K should be represented.

social_aqua

A) Acronym, B) Value, C) Unit, D) Year :
are mandatory in all rows,

K) Gender, L) Age, M) Education, N) Nationality, O) Employment_status :
at least one from K-O must be present in each row, cross-tabulation is preferred (e.g. Value by Gender, Age, Education, etc. combined). Over the full dataset, all variables K–O should be represented.

social_fleet

A) Acronym, B) Value, C) Unit, D) Year :
are mandatory in all rows,

N) Gender, O) Age, P) Education, Q) Nationality, R) Employment_status :
at least one from N-R must be present in each row, cross-tabulation is preferred (e.g. Value by Gender, Age, Education, etc. combined). Over the full dataset, all variables N–R should be represented.

social_proind

A) Acronym, B) Value, C) Unit, D) Year :
are mandatory in all rows,

H) Gender, I) Age, J) Education, K) Nationality :
at least one from H-K must be present in each row, cross-tabulation is preferred (e.g. Value by Gender, Age, Education, etc. combined). Over the full dataset, all variables H–K should be represented.

Data types

template fields	data type
acronym (variable code)	string from predefined list: socemploy, socfte, socunlab (socunlab not for processing data)
value	numeric with maximum 26 digits and not more than 4 decimals
unit	predefined string: number
year	integer between 2008 and the year of the data call minus one, year 2023 is mandatory for this year data call.
supra_reg	string from predefined list: see definitions, or leave it blank if not used
fishing_tech	string from predefined list: see definitions, or leave it blank if not used
vessel_length	string from predefined list: see definitions, or leave it blank if not used
geo_indicator	string from predefined list: see definitions (IWE, NEU, NGI are not applicable), or leave it blank if not used
gear	string from predefined list: see definitions, or leave it blank if not used
fishery	string from predefined list: see definitions, or leave it blank if not used
activity	string from predefined list: L, A, or leave it blank if not used
fishing activity	string from predefined list: SCF, LSF, DWF, L12AG
size_category	free text of not more than 50 characters; better if predefined string: ≤10, 11-49, 50-249, ≥250, or empty cell
main_species	free text, recommendation: salmon, trout, sea bass and sea bream, carp, tuna, eel, sturgeon, mussels, oyster, clam, crustaceans, seaweeds, multispecies, other freshwater fish, other marine fish, other molluscs, other aquatic animals. Preferably FAO 3-letter code.
main_technology	string from a predefined list: Ponds, Tanks and race-ways, Enclosures and pens, Recirculation systems, Other methods, Cages, Polyculture, Hatcheries and nurseries, Rafts, Longline, On-bottom, Other, or an empty cell
segment	string from a predefined list: total, seg.1.1, seg.1.2, ...seg.13.12, or an empty cell
environment	string from a predefined list: Algae, Freshwater, Marine, Shellfish, or an empty cell
age	any range, recommended at least: <=14, 15-24, 25-39, 40-64 (better if broken down, at least, by '40-54' and '55-64'), >=65, unknown, or leave it blank if not used
education	string from predefined list: High, Low, Medium, Unknown, or leave it blank (empty cell) if not used
employment_status	string from predefined list: Employee, Employee full, Employee part, Owner, Unknown
gender	string from predefined list: Female, Male, Unknown, or leave it blank (empty cell) if not used
nationality	string from predefined list: EEA, EU, National, non-EU/EEA, Unknown, or leave it blank (empty cell) if not used
farmer	free text, not more than 500 characters
fisher	free text, not more than 500 characters
worker	free text, not more than 500 characters
sampling_strategy	string from a predefined list: see definitions, or leave it blank if not used
comments	free text, not more than 500 characters
population_farm	number greater or equal to 0, or leave it blank if not used
responses_farm	number greater or equal to 0, or leave it blank if not used
population_farmer	number greater or equal to 0, or leave it blank if not used
responses_farmer	number greater or equal to 0, or leave it blank if not used
population_firms	number greater or equal to 0, or leave it blank if not used
responses_firms	number greater or equal to 0, or leave it blank if not used
population_fish	number greater or equal to 0, or leave it blank if not used
responses_fish	number greater or equal to 0, or leave it blank if not used
population_ves	number greater or equal to 0, or leave it blank if not used
responses_ves	number greater or equal to 0, or leave it blank if not used
population_workers	number greater or equal to 0, or leave it blank if not used
responses_workers	number greater or equal to 0, or leave it blank if not used

Note: upper-case or lower case or camel-case is all accepted by the system.