Virginia Polonio is a marine scientist, fisheries expert, and the knowledge behind Vekamar. Her career spans research institutions, international fieldwork, regulatory bodies, and fishing communities themselves — a breadth of experience that is genuinely rare in a sector where most expertise sits in only one of those worlds.

Her academic foundation is rigorous: a B.Sc. in Environmental Sciences, an M.Sc. in Fisheries Management and Aquaculture, and a Ph.D. in Biodiversity and Natural Resources from the University of Oviedo, where her research focused on Vulnerable Marine Ecosystems and contributed to the description of new deep-sea coral species. Before her doctorate, she worked as a researcher at the Spanish Oceanographic Institute — conducting sea-based fieldwork, leading stock assessments, and contributing to national data collection programmes across ICES and CECAF areas. It was there that she developed the ecosystem-based thinking that has shaped everything since.

Over the past decade, Virginia has led and participated in international projects spanning fisheries assessment, small-scale and artisanal fisheries, traceability, sustainability certification, and stakeholder engagement across Europe, Latin America, and beyond — coordinating multidisciplinary teams, building evidence bases, and translating complex science into decisions that hold in the real world.

In 2026, Virginia completed a postgraduate certificate in Marine Spatial Planning at Atlantic Technological University (ATU) Galway — adding a formal specialisation that deepens Vekamar’s capacity to work at the intersection of fisheries, conservation, and spatial governance. Her MSP work integrates spatial design, anthropogenic pressure analysis, and regulatory engagement, reflecting both the direction the sector is moving and the kind of joined-up expertise Vekamar is built to offer.

She founded Vekamar because she believed that serious marine expertise should be accessible — not locked inside large institutions or generic consultancies, but applied directly, with accountability and without unnecessary distance from the people and ecosystems it is meant to serve.