Quieter mid-week market in Newlyn this morning.

No moon and a handful of stars means that Newlyn's fish market is set against a jet-black sky this morning...

inside, things are a much brighter with a good selection of fish from the beam trawler St Georges which included these cracking undulate ray...

along with a mixture of top-drawer fish...

and red mullet...

megrim sole lookalikes witches...

and a few boxes of the prehistoric looking thornback ray...

the odd gray gurnard...

a box of eels...

and a few boxes of cod, known in many ports as 'green' - self-evident in this photo...

the were a few inshore trawl trips for the buyers...

on a relatively quiet market...

with only a few scattered boxes of mackerel for auction partly because it seems that the largest pods of dolphins seen in St Ives bay in living memory have broken up the mackerel shoals making it extremely difficult for the handliners to encourage the mackerel to feed or 'chew' as the guys might say...

just a couple of big squid for the beamer...

to go with plenty of megrim soles...

along with the...

monk tails and lemons soles...

and the inevitable haddock of course...

and plenty of megrims...

and a few boxes of the fish with the alien-like tails...

better known as John Dory...

Falfish's Edwin gets help to stack the morning's megrim purchases...

every fish has different features, thornback ray...

and large cod with its barbel...

all set to be sold...

Rowse's new crabber, Cesca is now in the fitting out berth...

with two different types of lights shining on the two white-hulled crabbers, finding the right 'white balance' setting...

proves a challenge...

two bows and a stern of the big three...

ahead, lays Don's Filadelfia all set for the next trip.

2019 sees new rules for living and working conditions on fishing vessels came into force at the start of the new year.

Under ILO 188 what is the impact on health and safety law for those working on board fishing vessels?

The legal framework for health and safety on board UK vessels and vessels operating in UK waters is found within The Merchant Shipping Act 1995;

Various Regulations passed under the 1995 Act (for example, The Merchant Shipping and Fishing Vessels (Health and Safety at Work) Regulations 1997); and Merchant Shipping Notices (MSNs) and Marine Guidance Notices (MGNs) issued by the MCA.

Depending on circumstances, a vessel’s owner and/or skipper can be guilty of a criminal offence and/or found liable to pay compensation in the event of a breach. An awareness of the laws and rules which apply to a particular vessel is therefore essential – no easy task when it appears to be a vast and fairly impenetrable legal framework.

The detail of the health and safety laws contained within these sources are unaffected by The Merchant Shipping (Work in Fishing Convention) Regulations 2018. Whilst the 2018 Regulations are described as promoting the welfare of seafarers, they contain very little substance on what most people would consider as “health and safety”. Instead, the MCA will issue new MGNs (Marine Guidance Notices) including one relating to health and safety, a draft of which is currently available on the MCA’s website. The draft MGN is largely a reminder of the health and safety principles and rules contained in those sources described above. It is made clear that they extend to all crew on board, whether employed or as share fishermen.

There is currently some additional, limited, guidance from the MCA as to how health and safety will be enforced going forward. For example, failure to ensure the provision and wearing of personal flotation devices (PFDs) and/or fall restrain harnesses where there is a risk of falling overboard will be considered by the MCA as a breach of health and safety legislation. It may be that we will see prosecutions of owners and skippers where crew are not wearing PFDs.

The most significant addition in the 2018 Regulations relating to health and safety is the introduction of a new criminal offence for a fisherman who “fails to comply with the lawful orders of the skipper regarding health and safety”. While crew have long had a statutory duty of care for their own safety, this new offence may see crew prosecuted when they fail to do so. In the context of the MCA’s stance on the wearing of PFDs, for example, we may see disputes as to whether an “order” to do so was actually given by the skipper. Does an “order” need to be a specific instruction or does the result of a risk assessment count?

Many fishermen will find aspects of the new regulations below contradictory to their own experience growing up with boats and with family at sea.

The 2018 Regulations also contain new rules on the minimum age of persons who are employed, or engaged to work, on a fishing vessel. They are:

• Under 16s are not permitted. The exception is 15-year-olds who are carrying out work experience during school holidays, provided that they hold a Basic Sea Survival ticket;

• Under 18s are not permitted where the nature of their activities, or the circumstances in which they are carried out, are likely to jeopardise that person’s health, safety or morals. There is an element of subjectivity and therefore uncertainty as to how this rule will be interpreted and enforced;

• Under 18s, with some exceptions relating to training requirements, must not work on a fishing vessel at night. While this regulation’s heading refers to “young persons on night duty” the actual wording of the regulation leaves some doubt as to whether it would apply when a crew member is sleeping overnight on board the vessel. If so, this could have a significant effect on the recruitment of school leavers for some vessel owners.

Breaches of these rules may constitute a criminal offence by the owner, skipper and employer, so it’s important that everyone is aware of the new rules and that, where there is ambiguity, clarification is established as quickly as possible.


All notices in relation to the Work in fishing convention (ILO 188)

The International Labour Organization’s work in fishing convention (ILO 188)came into force internationally on 16 November 2017. The UK government made legislation to implement ILO 188 in November 2018, and will ratify in January 2019.

ILO 188 entitles all fishermen to written terms and conditions of employment (a fisherman’s work agreement), decent accommodation and food, medical care, regulated working time, repatriation, social protection and health and safety on board. It also provides minimum standards relating to recruitment and placement and includes a mandatory requirement to have a certificate of medical fitness to work onboard a fishing vessel.

Who it applies to:

ILO 188 applies to all fishermen working on fishing vessels of any size, with more prescriptive standards for vessels over 24m in length or operating on longer voyages, three days or more.

ILO 188 statutory instruments:

SI2018/1106 The Merchant Shipping (Work in Fishing Convention) Regulations

SI2018/1107 The Merchant Shipping (Work in Fishing Convention) (Survey and Certification) Regulations

SI2018/1108 The Merchant Shipping (Work in Fishing Convention) (Medical Certification) Regulations

SI2018/1109 The Merchant Shipping (Work in Fishing Convention) (Consequential Provisions) Regulations.

ILO 188 phase in periods:

Different parts of legislation will be phased in as outlined.

Documents

MIN 575 ILO work in fishing convention medical certification grandfather rights

MGN 583 ILO work in fishing convention, fishermans work agreements
MGN 584 work in fishing convention repatriation
MGN 585 ILO work in fishing convention payment of fishermen
MGN 586 ILO work in fishing convention medical care
MGN 587 ILO work in fishing convention health and safety responsibilities
MGN 588 ILO work in fishing convention health and safety PFDs
MGN 589 ILO work in fishing convention complaints
MGN 596 - Fishing safety: Helping to improve safety - Fishing Vessels
MSN 1815 Amendment 2 equivalent medical certificates
MSN 1882 ILO work in fishing convention minimum age
MSN 1883 ILO work in fishing convention medical examination and certification
MSN 1884 ILO work in fishing convention working time
MSN 1885 ILO work in fishing convention survey and inspection
MSN 1886 MLC and ILO 188 medical standards
• MSN 1891 ILO work in fishing convention list of crew
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    2 November 2018
   
  • Guidance
  Published 23 November 2018 Last updated 13 December 2018 — see all updates
  
  

  
  Maritime and Coastguard Agency

An Irish initiative: "Quota Balancing for Demersal Stocks"

Latest fishing news from Ireland:

Marine minister Michael Creed has launched a public consultation on a proposal to implement a phased pilot quota balancing scheme for demersal stocks, to assist with the full implementation of the Landing Obligation.

Quota balancing means where a vessel exceeds its catch limit for a relevant stock during a fishery management period, a balancing adjustment is made from a future catch limit for that vessel.

A multiplying factor will apply; the greater the excess catch when compared with the catch limit, the larger the balancing adjustment that will be made.

The objective of the Landing Obligation is to eliminate ‘wasteful and unsustainable practice’ of discarding fish at sea.

Key Points:

 This is a pilot scheme for demersal stocks. A pilot scheme for pelagic stocks was introduced on 1 st January 2018 by the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine.

 Quota Balancing means that where a vessel exceeds its catch limit for a relevant stock during a fishery management period, a balancing adjustment is made from a future catch limit for that vessel.

 A multiplying factor applies so that the greater the excess catch when compared with the catch limit, the larger the balancing adjustment that will be made.

 A Quota Balancing system is being introduced on a phased basis to assist with the full implementation of the Landing Obligation requirements. The objective of the Landing Obligation is to eliminate the wasteful and unsustainable practice of discarding fish at sea.

 The Quota Balancing system is a management, conservation and rational exploitation measure that will aid the Minister in matching catch limit to actual catch to support the Landing Obligation requirements.

 The arrangements will aim to provide for a small bycatch for the relevant demersal stocks to support the continuation of other fisheries in the area, as long as there is national quota available.

 Quota Balancing by the Department is independent of any action being considered or taken by the control authorities.

First Monday morning market in Newlyn

With the spell of fine weather running into its second week the market floor was full of fish this morning...

although there were only limited supplies of MSC Certified Cornish hake from the Stelissa...

inshore boats and beam trawlers added to the wide range of species landed...

including these silver darlings...

a boxful of congers...

handfuls of red mullet...

and squid from the Imogen III...

while the big beam trawler Billy Rowney weighed in with a big trip of white fish which included plenty of good sized megrim...

and Dover soles...

outside the market there was clear evidence that many 1000s of kg of cuttlefish had been landed...

along with plaice...

lemon soles...

and even more plaice from the Sapphire II...

more thn enough to keep Stevenson's chief auctioneer busy...

auctioning superb quality fish like...

these John Dory fought over...

by two of the buyers in the market...

with plenty of good flats to come...

and a demonstration of the crane position lifting technique...

name the fish with the single barbel...

in pristine-white condition, the mighty-mouthed turbot...

red mullet and black bream, quality fish...

monk cheeks make great eating...

as do the fresh mackerel, of which there are abundant supplies at the moment...

unlike the elusive bass which are much harder to find and catch...

superb monk tails...

and the odd box of scallops came from the Sapphire III...

handsome hake...

she's all set to go aground - a classic Cornish 'tosher' built for Harvey's Shellfish back in the 70s to fish for crab in the summer and handline mackerel in the winter.

Busy weekend in and around Newlyn.

There's always something to see off Lands End looking towards the Longships...

or around the rock known as the Brisons...

local boats, like the crabber Nimrod who work close to the shore...

during daylight hours are lucky enough to be kept watch over by those admirable volunteers who man the Cape Cornwall watch station...

the second only to be opened and run by the National Coastwatch Institution - if you want to volunteer as a watchkeeper then visit the website here...

and who knows, you could soon get to enjoy stunning views like tis on a regular basis...

just landed, the netter Britannia V...

just made it home before dark, Rowse Fishing's latest crabber to join the fleet - the Cesca, the second vessel to bear that name - she was fitted out in Cape Town, South Africa then made a three week sea voyage as cargo

aboard the 399m container ship, MSC Altamira...

before arriving in the Port of London where she was put in the water and steamed back starting yesterday...

bow-on view of the Cesca alongside the Intuition...

stern view.

A new European policy bans the practice of discarding fish.

Controversial European policy bans ships from throwing unwanted fish overboard

Long before fillets reach your dinner plate, lots of seafood is thrown away. Overboard, actually. As fishing crews sort through their catches, they toss unwanted fish back into the sea—as much as 20% of the global catch. The vast majority die. On 1 January, the wasteful practice became illegal in waters of the European Union. Scientists believe the policy will lead to more efficient fisheries and eventually boost stocks. But in the short term it could mean hardship for the industry and perhaps even compromise fisheries data, because almost all crews can discard fish without anyone knowing. “This is one of the most dramatic changes in EU fisheries policy,” says Peder Andersen, an economist at the University of Copenhagen.

Read the The European Landing Obligation "Reducing Discards in Complex, Multi-Species and Multi-Jurisdictional Fisheries" by 
Editors: Sven Sebastian, Uhlmann Clara and Ulrich Steven J. Kennelly 

Regulators began to phase in the discard ban, formally known as the Landing Obligation, in 2015. To ease the pain, they started with vessels that didn’t discard much because they catch schools of herring and other single species. Now comes the bigger challenge: fisheries where many species live together, such as those in the North Sea. When vessels drag nets near or along the bottom, they end up with a jumble of species and sizes. Until now, vessels only kept the valuable portion of their catch. The discarding of young fish, which haven’t yet reproduced much, has been a particular impediment to sustainability. Under the ban, fishing vessels must bring back all regulated species, a significant headache. More time will be spent sorting fish, as even the unwanted ones must be tallied and brought to port. Holds will fill up faster, meaning more trips to sea and higher fuel costs. And unwanted fish will be sold for a fraction of the price of the normal catch, if it can be sold at all. The hope is that the ban will incentivise vessels to adopt more selective fishing gear or strategies.

A second problem for industry is that the ban creates the prospect of “choke species” that threaten to shut down fishing. In a fishery with a mix of species, a vessel might catch the same proportion of species each time it trawls, despite varying quotas for the allowed catch of each. Before the discard ban, this wasn’t a problem: Fishers could keep catching haddock and whiting, for example, even after reaching their cod quota. They simply threw away, legally, any new cod caught.

Now, vessels will have to stop fishing once they reach their quota for choke species like cod in some places. Haddock or whiting quotas will go unused—a lost economic opportunity. “Choke species are a huge problem,” says Daniel Voces de Onaindi, managing director of Europêche, a lobbying group in Brussels. “We’re talking about destroying boats, and unemployment.” The discard ban does exempt species, such as Norway lobster, that typically survive after they are returned to the water. And last month, EU fisheries ministers boosted quotas for five species, despite scientific advice to protect these stocks.

Still, case studies from DiscardLess, an EU-funded research project that wraps up this month, suggest the fishing industry could suffer losses on the order of 10% for several years if the ban is enforced.

Over the longer term, the discard ban will boost fish stocks and benefit the overall ecosystem, according to modelling led by Marie Savina-Rolland of the French Research Institute for the Exploitation of the Sea, an oceanographic research centre in Lorient. That could eventually translate to higher quotas and profits, says Andersen, who co-led economic research for the DiscardLess project.

The ban could also stimulate more research on new fishing gear and tactics to avoid unwanted catches. Researchers have already shown benefits from separator trawls, which have a horizontal panel at the opening. Haddock and whiting tend to swim upward when the trawl approaches. The panel diverts them into an upper net, whereas cod and monkfish are collected by a lower net. Unwanted species can escape through an opening in the net. Equipping fishing gear with light-emitting diodes can also help reduce by-catch, DiscardLess researchers have found, by discouraging some unwanted species from entering trawl nets. But these techniques also lose some of the commercial catch, so industry has not adopted them widely. “It’s rare to get a situation where you can avoid unwanted sizes or species and not pay a penalty with the fish you do want,” says David Reid, a fisheries ecologist at the Marine Institute in Oranmore, Ireland.

More quota trading could also help industry cope. If a vessel or fleet has run out of quota to catch cod in its mixed trawls, for example, it could offer its quota of whiting to a fleet with the opposite problem. Last month, EU fisheries ministers increased pressure on nations to start trading quotas. “It’s basically banging their heads together and saying you must swap quotas for this to work,” says Andrew Clayton, who directs the Pew Charitable Trusts’s campaign to end overfishing in northwest Europe and is based in London.

Few expect all fishing vessels to obey the discard ban. “Put yourself in the boots of a fishermen who can see he will run out of quota for a species. If he does, he would have to tie up for the rest of the year. He might have to sell the boat, or sell the house,” says Barrie Deas, CEO of the National Federation of Fishermen’s Organisations in York, U.K. “What’s he going to do?”

Scofflaws could jeopardise not just fish stocks, but also data about how they are faring. Researchers, who suggest catch levels to regulators, get their discard data largely from independent observers on just a few boats—less than 1% of the EU fleet. Observed boats are now likely to discard much fewer fish than other vessels, leaving an official undercount of the discard rate and a falsely rosy picture of how heavily stocks are fished, says Lisa Borges, a fisheries biologist who runs a consultancy called FishFix in Lisbon. “It could bring about a very big, negative change,” Borges says. “I get very worried about European fisheries management.”

Environmentalists want to toughen up enforcement by installing cameras on ships, the practice in New Zealand and a few other places with discard bans. But Voces de Onaindi says this is impractical on some vessels and raises privacy concerns. The lesson from countries where discard bans have succeeded, including Norway and Iceland, Andersen says, is that the gradual introduction of incentives and controls—to develop the economic use of unwanted fish, and create a culture of regulatory compliance—lessens conflict but can take decades to achieve.

Read here for more articles by Erik Stokstad. This was published on Jan. 4, 2019.

FISHING INTO THE FUTURE : THE BUSINESS OF FISHING

Calling All Fishermen, Sign Up Is Open!

It’s the moment you have all been waiting for, New Year, New Course and Fully Funded, Limited places.

FISHING INTO THE FUTURE : THE BUSINESS OF FISHING

Join us on our celebrated Business of Fishing course based at the rural setting of Thainstone House in Inverurie near Aberdeen.

Business of Fishing 26th—28th February 2019, FULLY FUNDED Essential training for fishermen

• Fisheries Science • Fisheries Management • Fisheries Economics

This industry-supported 3-day residential workshop seeks to bring all who attend on a journey into the what, when and why of fisheries science and management.

You will work with other like-minded professionals in a neutral setting to explore and interrogate the processes involved, share insights and build understanding away from the pressures of fishery regulation.

The course has been built with the help of fishermen: it will meet your needs by complimenting your current knowledge whilst providing you with practical opportunities to go deep ‘under the bonnet’ of fisheries science and management.

We hope it will stretch your thinking: no in-depth scientific knowledge is needed to enrol; just come with an open mind and a willing spirit.

This course is focused on the science and management that underpins quota-based fisheries – those fisheries reliant on scientific advice from ICES. All fishermen, from all sectors are welcome – this is great opportunity to learn from each other, whatever sector or area of Scotland you are operating in.

PLEASE CALL OUR TEAM WITH ANY QUESTIONS

Mike Park (SWFPA) on 07710504773
Kenny Coull (SWFPA) on 07718483600
Derek Cardno (SFF) on 01224 646944 or 07545 429314
Jim Masters (FITF) on 01803 659219 or 07


Apply online to attend the course.

Your industry is investing in your future.

Meals and accommodation are provided; some travel support is available for participants.