Stay at Home: Get #FishToYourDoor

Seafood Cornwall’s #FishToYourDoor scheme is ready to supply fresh fish from Cornish fishermen as millions in the UK are ordered to ‘stay at home’ once again. 

Despite a bitterly disappointing Brexit deal for UK fisheries, and lockdown 3.0 looming over the country, Cornwall’s resilient fishermen continue braving winter waters to secure fresh, sustainable fish. And Seafood Cornwall’s #FishToYourDoor scheme - running continuously since lockdown 1.0 in March 2020 - is ready to enter into a third wave of contact-free delivery activity, nationwide.

Set up as an emergency response to the first lockdown, #FishToYourDoor’s main aim was to support local Cornish fishing businesses. As European borders closed, and hospitality venues shut down across the UK the market for fresh fish plummeted and fishermen had nowhere to sell their catch. But within just 48 hours of the lockdown announcement, #FishToYourDoor had connected over 1,000 isolated and vulnerable people across the UK to Cornish fishermen and fish merchants. 

Since this emergency response, #FishToYourDoor has continued to grow, connecting and engaging with over 7,000 customers and advancing from a match-making service on social media to a dedicated webpage and member of staff personally connecting every individual to a trusted Cornish fish merchant or fisherman. #FishToYourDoor has more exciting plans for 2021, which have been built on direct feedback from loyal customers across the year, but for now, it’s here to support people staying at home and fighting the COVID pandemic.

“Cornwall Fish Direct is proud to be a #FishToYourDoor merchant. We signed up to be a part of the scheme earlier this year, not only to support our fishing community and our fleet of Cornish fishing boats, but to ensure that every person in the UK, regardless of where they live, had access to fresh, seasonal, traceable Cornish fish. This latest lockdown is a perfect opportunity to sign up to #FishToYourDoor, support small fishing businesses, try something new, and keep strong and healthy by eating fresh fish!” Antony Hosking, Co-owner of Cornwall Fish Direct

The #FishToYourDoor scheme runs based on a simple match-making service that is run via the Seafood Cornwall website, where fish aficionados can also access recipe inspiration and guidance about local Cornish species. A Seafood Cornwall customer, Katie Stilwell, comments: "With an impressive variety of incredible Cornish species, there’s always a chance to try something new and if you can’t make your mind up, I found that all merchants offer fresh fish boxes with mixed species. You can also decide if you want your fish filleted so you know that when your fish arrives at your door, it can go straight into the pan!" In lockdown 1.0, #FishToYourDoor is credited with providing a lifeline for many Cornish fishing and seafood businesses. Paul Trebilcock, CEO of the Cornish Fish Producers’ Organisation (representing 160 vessels in the Cornish fishing fleet), and head of the Seafood Cornwall initiative, explains why #FishToYourDoor is asking the nation to support fishermen once again.

“#FishToYourDoor was set up rapidly, as a direct response to the pandemic, but has now grown into a remarkable scheme that has helped to strengthen fishing businesses in Cornwall. One of our #FishToYourDoor merchants, Marisco Fish, thought their business would suffer when the hospitality sector shut down, but due to the success of customers signing up to Fish to Your Door they hired a new member of staff and increased their supply of fresh fish to the domestic market.

Fishing communities had an incredibly tough 2020, like all of us, and proved just how adaptable they can be. With the recent Brexit deal providing a big disappointment to Cornwall’s fishermen, #FishToYourDoor may be a much-needed light during a dark start to the year - and what’s great is we can help keep other communities fed under lockdown. A win-win.”

If you would like to support fishing communities and try some fresh Cornish fish whilst locked down at home, please sign up to #FishToYourDoor here. You can also find us on Instagram and Twitter.

A new beginning - Provisional fishing quota to be announced following UK-EU agreement.

The UK government has announced that provisional catch limits for fishermen in the UK will be set shortly. 

The UK government has announced that provisional catch limits for fishermen in the UK will be set shortly.

The UK government has today (31 December) announced that provisional catch limits for fishermen in the UK will be set shortly to ensure fishing continues uninterrupted until annual fisheries negotiations with the EU, Norway and Faroe Islands conclude.

The UK government, following consultation with the Devolved Administrations and Marine Management Organisation, will set provisional catch limits in line with the UK/EU Trade and Cooperation Agreement. These will generally be calculated using a percentage of the International Council for the Exploration of the Sea (ICES) advice for each stock. Where needed, a higher allocation will be made for seasonal fisheries.

The annual negotiations will take place now the UK and EU have concluded the Trade and Cooperation Agreement. Under that agreement, the UK will see year on year increases in our share of the total allowable catch, moving from just over half of the quota stocks in our own waters now, to two thirds of the stocks in our waters after five and a half years.

Fisheries Minister, Victoria Prentis said: 

For the first time in 40 years we enter into annual fisheries negotiations as an independent coastal State.

"As a responsible independent coastal State we are taking measures to ensure that we fish sustainably, and that our fishermen can continue to operate smoothly while those annual negotiations take place."

"As the UK/EU Trade and Cooperation Agreement states, UK vessels will be permitted to fish in EU waters and EU vessels in UK waters. However, from 1 January, UK and EU vessels must not fish in each other’s waters without a licence. Licensing of UK and EU vessels will begin shortly."

Until agreement is reached with Norway and the Faroe Islands, UK vessels are not permitted to fish in their waters and vice versa.

Published 31 December 2020 From: Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs and Victoria Prentis MP

TAKING STOCK AND MOVING FORWARD 4TH JANUARY 2021 IN BREXIT, CORONAVIRUS, EUROPE / COMMON FISHERIES POLICY

The NFFO are looking for a more positive outcome to counteract the apparent negativity being felt by many fishermen in the industry;

As the old year faded away, and the new year dawns, we lick our wounds and take stock of the tasks that lie in front of us.

UK/EU Partnership Agreement

In the wake of the Agreement reached with the EU on Christmas eve, our immediate task was to blunt the Government’s attempts to present the outcome on fisheries as a famous victory. In Parliament and right across the media the country and the world, through the Federation’s efforts, was made to understand that, in echoes of 1973, the UK fishing industry had again been sacrificed for other national objectives.

Given the hundreds of thousands of businesses and livelihoods at stake without a trade deal, perhaps this was a brutal, but inevitable, choice. What infuriated the fishing industry was the transparent attempt to present the meagre gains as a transformational leap forward as an independent coastal state.

There is an exact measure of what the UK has achieved and has not achieved in the negotiations. It is the distance between the EU’s fisheries relationship with Norway, where two coastal states meet as equals, and the bloc’s relationship with the UK, where on access and quota shares, the UK remains tied into an asymmetric and exploitative arrangement on fishing rights. As with any colonial or neo-colonial relationship like this, there will be inherent tensions and instabilities that will colour the next few years and beyond.

Taking Stock and Moving Forward

The NFFO Executive Committee met on 30th December and agreed that the two national federations had done all in their powers to secure a future as a truly independent coastal state. Having poured scorn on the government’s efforts to deceive the scale of its defeat of fisheries, the Executive concluded that the Federation had little choice but to look forward.

Immediate Issues

A series of immediate questions over how the new regime would operate from 1st January were raised and notified to Defra. Prominent amongst these were how to avoid parts of the fleet being worse off in 2021 in the wake of meagre and unevenly distributed uplifts in UK quota shares, the absence of an international quota swaps mechanism, the retention of the landing obligation in EU retained law and attendant choke risks. There is scope within the EU agreement for quota transfers at state-to-state level throughout the year, but it will be important to make progress during the forthcoming negotiations for a fisheries agreement with the EU for 2021. Talks are expected to begin this week and the NFFO will meet with the Defra team on 5th January to discuss priorities.

Trade issues under the new regime will also be a central focus.

Announcements are expected on the consultations run by Defra prior to Christmas on: 

• The allocation of “new” quota between fisheries administrations 
• The allocation of “new” quota inside England 
• Economic link licensing requirements 
• Remote Electronic Monitoring 
• How the Government decides to approach these issues will carry significant consequences for the years ahead. 

Longer Term

The Executive agreed to work on a strategic plan for the Federation that takes account of the fact that the UK is now outside the CFP, albeit tied and constrained in various ways by the framework agreement.

This work is now underway and although at an early stage it is clear that the following elements will feature:

• A workable landing obligation 
• Reform of inshore fisheries management 
• Shellfish Policy 
• Non-Quota Species 
• International negotiations and quotas exchanges 
• Joint Fisheries Statements and Fisheries Management Plans Fishing 
• Vessel Safety and Crew Welfare Covid-19

No one will be unaware that the new variant covid virus has caused a steep increase in the infection rate and restrictions have been and continued to be stepped up. This in turn will impact on the market for fish and shellfish, although in uneven and different ways, sector by sector. 

Parts of the fleet lack resilience because the winter storms of 2019/20 reduced earnings, followed by varying economic impacts of covid restrictions during the rest of the year. The MMO/Defra are monitoring the impacts on landings and prices and the case for further government support is mounting. The Federation will remain at the heart of any response and will remain in close dialogue with Government.

First online fish auction of 2021 in Newlyn.

The first 'clock' auction for 2021 gets underway with auctioneers Ryan and Ian at the helm...

and it's good to see a bumper mix of quality fish that has given Newlyn its reputation for providing the most divers range of fish on a regular basis to UK consumers like lemon sole...

red mullet...

and the very best day boat caught from inshore trawlers like the Still Waters...

and the Immy...

along with whiting...

and even the odd cod...

the new regime involves printed tallies that ID the box of fish bought by the buyers from their terminals...

that are dropped on each box...

identified by weight...

and vessel name...

which means the practice of using individual tallies...

has not changed...

since the introduction of...

the online auction...

each box also indicates the quality and provenance of the fish....

and a quality grade - though there don't seem to be any grades for gill and trammel net or inshore trawl fish as yet ...

I'm sure the Spirited Lady would rather not have the A+ beam trawl classification given the short length of time at sea and overall quality of its fish given that the same quality mark would include a 40m beam trawler towing 10m beam trawls and spending 8 days at sea...

with some fine(ish) weather over the weekend landings of mackerel came thick and fast ...

from the handliners both in Mounts Bay...

and St Ives...

at this time of year the inshore trawlers always seem to pick up good shots of ray...

and the odd cod...

with the Spirited Lady...

Still Waters...

and the Immy getting in on the act...

well, we may not be in the Mediterranean but this big fella bears the name...

here's looking at you...

said the gurnard to the conger...

the Algrie...

and the Trevessa IV picked up a few more cod, not a common fish in south western waters at this time of ear and certainly nowhere near in the kind of quantities to keep even a few of the local chippies supplied with the UK's favourite Friday night fish supper...

so it would be good to see more of them put ray wings on their menus...

also not too common at this time of year, John Dory, very much a summer fish...

while these little chaps just seem to appear anywhere you put down a trawl...

a trio of fine brill...

catch the eye of retired sardine skipper Pete 'bigger the balls' Buckland, now with his feet firmly ashore...

haddock will be one of the key fish to feature in any forthcoming TAC quota negotiations between the Uk and the EU...

now that buying takes place inline the market floor is now devoid of buyers and porters...

where to clean your boots...

the main auction hall was empty this morning...

Falmouth registered Ocean Pride alongside the market...

looks like an our or two's worth of mending for the boys on the sardiner Vesta...

two...

and two more of Rowse's crabbers take a break...

Golden Harvest's sardine net in its entirety on the quayside.

 

Meanwhile, some good fisher, sorry, fishing news!

'This is where I need to be': the UK women defying fishing stereotypes.

Not-for-profit Women in Fisheries aims to get more women involved in male-dominated industry.

Amy Rose, fishing in Newlyn Amy Rose, fishing in Newlyn, said her girlfriends were excited about her job.

Superstition among fishing crews has traditionally said that women on ships are bad luck – and it is among many of the reasons women in the fishing industry are in short supply. Now though, they are being urged to join Britain’s fishing fleet by the first UK company to emerge that is actively encouraging women to fish.

British Women in Fisheries was set up last month to get more women involved as fleet managers, skippers, commercial fishers, fishmongers, processors or gutters, among other areas.

It comes after the BBC Radio 4’s Today programme sparked a row for using the term “fisherpeople’” in a news report. Europe editor Katya Adler’s gender-neutral description during a package on Brexit talks caused some listeners to argue that women only fill a fraction of the jobs, pointing to a study finding only 2.7% are female.

Fishing, and control of who fishes in UK waters, became a central part of the Brexit negotiations and some industry leaders claim the deal struck with Brussels will do long-term damage to their prospects.

Laney Black, 48, one of the co-founders of UK Women in Fisheries who works on a trawler, says she would love to see more women involved. Black trawls for langoustines and works 18-hour shifts most days.

“Our days are dependent on the tide and the moon and the weather but on an average day we would be leaving harbour around teatime, so 4 or 5pm, and by the time we return to land with langoustines cleaned up it is around an 18-hour shift. It’s mostly a night shift but can vary – sometimes a day shift dependent on tides,” she said.

The aim of their new not-for-profit company is to bring women who fish together. “We are drawing the plans for it at the moment but the main goal is to mentor and support, and give training for women in all sectors of the fishing industry,” she said.

The inspiration behind the project came to Black after she was involved in a government-funded study a year ago that meant she met more women who work on boats. “I found it inspiring to meet women who had up until now a very solitary career,” she said.

Black added it was hard to tell how many women fish but she did not know many other female trawlers. She said women “don’t realise it is something they can or want to do”.

“It’s very male-dominated,” she said. “The old-fashioned views about women on boats is an issue. At careers day [in school] you never have anyone coming up telling you that you can work in fishing … It still seems to be a taboo but it does seem to be changing and we are trying to combat that kind of thinking.”

Another woman who has been promoting fishing through her Instagram is Ashley Mullenter, 33, who has been commercially fishing in Norfolk for over two years. “About 11 years ago I booked an angling trip and I went out and had a lightbulb moment and thought ‘this is where I need to be’. The skipper could not get rid of me after that till eventually he said just turn up when you want and jump on and have a go and asked me to work on a commercial boat, gutting fish.”

Ashley Mullenter: ‘I had a lightbulb moment and thought this is where I need to be.’ Her work is very physical. “It’s a long day,” she said, which means it can be a hard industry for mothers. “If you’re at sea 12-16 hours that will make it hard [for women with children]. You need a good support network to help you.”

“It is a very male-dominated industry and a lot of women may be intimidated by that but that may be their own preconceptions. Everyone I have met in the industry – mostly men – are really supportive.”

Women who fish are “few and far between”, she said, but she would like to see more getting involved.

Amy Isobel Rose, 31, works in Newlyn, a fishing town in south-west Cornwall and said she had worked at sea on private yachts since she was 21. “I came back to Penzance last year with the intention of having a year off at home then going back to yachting at the start of this year, which of course was ruined by Covid.”

“Having grown up in Penzance, I went to school with most of the fishermen or their kids, so it was just a case of convincing one to take me to sea. Eventually, Danny, my current skipper, agreed to … He thought I just wanted to go for a jolly, but as soon as I let the lines go from the quay he said he knew he could take me seriously and I’ve been fishing with him since.”

Her duties involve line handling, net repairs, gear maintenance and wash-downs. “Physically I’m finding it hard at the moment, but that’s more because I’ve done zero exercise for the past couple of years, whereas these guys have been fishing for years and are used to the physical demands,” she said.

She added that fishing does not always appeal to women as it can be a very physically demanding, smelly, dirty job with erratic and unsociable hours.

“None of my girlfriends has expressed an interest for giving it a go, but they’re all stoked on me being out here.”

Full story courtesy of Sarah Marsh @sloumarsh at the Guardian Newspaper.

French fishermen working in UK waters.

Laurent's catch is brought ashore Image: 

 

French fishermen have spoken of their relief after a Brexit deal was struck  French fishermen working in UK waters before receiving official licences One captain says he has decided to keep fishing, regardless of official licensing requirements, as his livelihood depends on it.

On the quayside in Boulogne-sur-Mer, a small crowd is gathering. As they watch, a boat ties up and starts to unload its haul. In this fishing town, they know the significance of this. The tradition is that nobody goes to sea on New Year's Day, so this is the first catch of 2021 - crabs, lobsters, sea snails and some assorted other fish.

'These are Mr Johnson's crabs,' the captain says. 

A father pushes his child to the front to watch; some are taking photos.

We went out with the crew of this boat during the summer, watching as they entered British waters to access crab and lobster pots and talking to the captain, Laurent, about his views on Brexit.

Back then, he was calm, expecting a deal, but in the months that followed he became more and more worried. A few weeks ago, when we last spoke to the skipper, he was increasingly anxious that Brexit was about to see his boat banned from British waters.

Full story courtesy of Adam Parsons - Business correspondent Europe correspondent @adamparsons 

The MMO has published full documentation of all Uk and EU fishing vessels that are eligible to fish in UK waters.

The boat in story above is the 11.92m Laurent Geoffrey from Boulogne, one of 632 French vessels on the new register. A full set of documents has been published here.