4 Portrait
Pierre Arzel, biologist and seaweed specialist
Pierre Arzel, biologour arbennikaet war ar bezhin en Efremor
Born in Porspoder in Finistère, Pierre Arzel (1947-2008) gained a postgraduate diploma in biological oceanography from the University of Western Brittany in 1971.
In 1976 he joined Cnexo, the French national centre for ocean exploitation, before moving to Ifremer when it was founded in 1984. There he became the first seaweed specialist, responsible for monitoring how this resource was changing.
Author of a doctoral thesis on seaweed harvesting in France, Pierre Arzel also wrote many books on the subject, notably Les Goémoniers, published in 1987 by Chasse-Marée.
Throughout his career and his research, he followed the trade closely and lent his expertise to its development and mechanisation: the introduction of harvest logbooks, and the development of the scoubidou (a rotating hook used to pull kelp from the seabed).