Taking stock of EU fisheries restructuring

The EU could champion data transparency to the  world 

In the global arena, the EU is a key player on fisheries negotiations - given the size of its market and subsidies - under the Doha Development Agenda of the WTO. But while WTO trade negotiations have admittedly moved at a snail’s pace, pushing for increased transparency and reporting on fisheries subsidies would be an opportunity for the EU to galvanise support from willing WTO members. 

This could make a real difference even without further negotiations. Subsidies notification and trade policy review processes help to improve access to information about national programmes, promoting information exchange and continued discussion of national subsidy policies within formal WTO conversations. Enhancing access to information and transparency with regards to subsidy notification is one element of the fisheries subsidies reform agenda where practical solutions are available and achievable, but this will require the right political will. 

At the WTO Ministerial Meeting in Bali, Indonesia in December 2013, the EU missed an opportunity to join a group of governments who reaffirmed their commitment not to introduce any new subsidies that contribute to overfishing or the overcapacity of fishing fleets. The EU could do a lot more to reduce global overcapacity and overfishing. As a first step, however, championing improved transparency would be one easy and practical way where the EU could play a constructive role at the WTO once again. 

See more at: http://ictsd.org/i/news/bioresreview/187943/#sthash.8AbXgw5W.dpuf

Newlyn and the Sea - showing this weekend at the Newlyn Centre Archive

The next Open Day NEWLYN and the SEA on Friday & Saturday April 11-12 2014, 10.00-3.00 at Trinity Centre Newlyn is a two-day event so we hope everyone can get there. The exhibition of old photos and historical memorabilia deals with the many facets of Newlyn's relationship with the sea.

We have done a lot of work getting together the story of the Lifeboats that served Newlyn, originally based at Penzance and Wherrytown, then at Newlyn for a short period (1907-1913) then at Penlee Point for 23 years and then back to Newlyn in 1983.

The old photo above shows where the Lifeboat was located at Wherrytown in the very early days. The coastguard station is on the left and the row of cottages on the right was sometimes called Coastguards Row. Below you can see the old Lifeboat 'Richard Lewis', which was stationed at Wherrytown 1865-1884 with the coastguard station behind.

What is the Common Fisheries Policy? - everything you need to know!

What is the Common Fisheries Policy?

The CFP is a set of rules for managing European fishing fleets and for conserving fish stocks. Designed to manage a common resource, it gives all European fishing fleets equal access to EU waters and fishing grounds and allows fishermen to compete fairly.

Stocks may be renewable, but they are finite. Some of these fishing stocks, however, are being overfished. As a result, EU countries have taken action to ensure the European fishing industry is sustainable and does not threaten the fish population size and productivity over the long term.

The CFP was first introduced in the 1970s and went through successive updates, the most recent of which took effect on 1 January 2014.

What are the aims of the Common Fisheries Policy?

The CFP aims to ensure that fishing and aquaculture are environmentally, economically and socially sustainable and that they provide a source of healthy food for EU citizens. Its goal is to foster a dynamic fishing industry and ensure a fair standard of living for fishing communities.

Although it is important to maximise catches, there must be limits. We need to make sure that fishing practices do not harm the ability of fish populations to reproduce. The current policy stipulates that between 2015 and 2020 catch limitsshould be set that are sustainable and maintain fish stocks in the long term.

To this day, the impact of fishing on the fragile marine environment is not fully understood. For this reason, the CFP adopts a cautious approach which recognises the impact of human activity on all components of the ecosystem. It seeks to make fishing fleets more selective in what they catch, and to phase out the practice of discarding unwanted fish.

The reform also changes the way in which the CFP is managed, giving EU countries greater control at  national and regional level.

The CFP has 4 main policy areas:

• Fisheries management
• International policy
• Market and trade policy
• Funding of the policy

The CFP also includes rules on aquaculture and stakeholder involvement

Fisheries fund helps fishermen to comply with new common fisheries policy explains ECR group

Jennifer Baker is joined by James Holtum, spokesperson for the ECR Group, to discuss the vote on the European Maritime and Fisheries Fund.

Holtum explains that this vote in the Committee on Fisheries will bring an end to the long running European Union’s Common Fisheries Policy (CFP) reform. “This fund provides 6.5 billion euros aid which is intended to support all the policies within the CFP”, explains the spokesperson for the ECR Group. This fund would help fishermen comply with the new CFP requirements. One of the areas where financial assistance is needed is stopping the harmful to nature practice of discarding edible fish, claims Holtum. The vote on the European Maritime and Fisheries Fund took place on Monday 7 April.

Sounds great when you hear those words - but the truth of the matter is that the whole discards movement, though well-intentioned, is ill-conceived in detail - mixed fisheries and changing catch patterns (like the now abundant haddock in the Western approaches off Cornwall and the arrival of hake in the North Sea where there is a miniscule quota) are now likely to make the term 'choke species' trend on Twitter amongst fishermen as they try and battle their way through a simplistic piece of EU legislation.

Those who live by the water on the water

Video courtesy of Berta Tilmantaite, award winning multi-media journalist. A beautiful and lyrical short film from a boat trip through Myanmar, Burmar.

Supermarket Secrets - how the Tescos are sourcing seasonal fish

Some supermarkets are making an effort to go with the seasonality of products and sell fresh and not frozen fish when they are in season and even sourced locally. Watch as Greg Wallace leaves the comfort of the Masterchef studio and heads for one of his favourite haunts, an early morning market - in this case it's the fish market at Brixham in Devon. 

Braving the chilled temperature controlled environment Tesco's head fish honcho Gary Hooper takes Greg on a guided tour of the fish auction and shows him the fish they are now pushing on some of their 480 wet fish counters as seasonal alternatives to cod, haddock and salmon the perennial favourites of the UK piscine palate. Ling and hake - both caught in bigger quantities these days by the netting fleet in Newlyn feature - some of the Newlyn netters put all or part of their catch to Brixham every landing so as not to saturate thier home market with fish.

Next up, Greg heads west and joins the highly specialised catamaran Lyonesse as she makes her way @ThroughtheGaps and out into Mount's Bay for a spot of sardine hunting - though it seems that chefs and sardines prove to be something of an oxymoron as Greg proves marginally more successful than some of his predecessors like Sanjay Kumar or more infamously Sir Keith Floyd and manages half a basket of the elusive sardine - proving that fishing is as unpredictable as ever and fish even more so!

A load of codswallop - a deafening silence as Norway manages to export 20% more cod than it caught!

Aplogies for using the most clichéd of clichés - but there's something fishy going on here - as Fishing News editor Cormac Burke comments, there seems to be a deafening silence from the likes of Norway, any of the environmental groups who hold Norway on an evergreen pedestal when it comes to fishing practice and sustainability and the very supermarkets who have been so keen to promote their accredited fish over and above our own and in particular cod from Scottish boats fishing the same sea area!


Editor Cormac Burke's Comment article on the story from last week's fishing industry trade paper for fishermen, Fishing News:

It’s all a cod…

Norwegian cod scam – but a deafening silence from Norway, UK retailers and green groups

The lead story in this week’s issue of Fishing News, regarding the revelation that it appears that Norway is exporting 20% more cod that it reportedly lands, is extremely interesting on several fronts.

The Norwegian TV programme credits say: "We follow two teenagers on the all-time cod fishing, an industry in large valleys: Some make money, others say cheating destroys the industry's reputation and economy. And some dare not speak for fear of being blacklisted."

Besides the obvious point that, should these allegations prove to be true, this will transpire to be more than embarrassing for those who hold the Norwegian cod fishery to be one of the most sustainable in the world, but it could/should also impact on the prices being offered at home for UK-caught cod.

Despite my breaking this story on IntraFish.com last week, there seems to be a deafening silence from: (a) Norway; (b) the major UK retailer chains who opt to promote and sell Norwegian cod rather than UK cod because they claim it is from a more sustainable fishery and; (c) green groups.

IntraFish.com contacted the Norwegian Seafood Council to ask if there had been any backlash or negative feedback from UK retailers as a result of the recent news but they denied this and said that the story had “barely caused a ripple”.

But at a time when every single move by the United Kingdom (UK) fishing industry seems to be under the media spotlight, why then have the national news media not picked up on this story and be demanding that UK food store chains carry out an investigation into the so called “super sustainability” claims by Norway regarding their cod fishery?

And, if any doubt or evidence of this fishery perhaps not being as squeaky clean as previously thought, then UK retailers should turn to UK-caught cod instead of imports and support UK fishermen.

Meanwhile however, the cynic in me can’t help feeling that if this exact same story had occurred in the UK fishing industry, then green groups everywhere would be jumping all over it – claiming that cod stocks are being fished to extinction by unscrupulous UK fishermen.

Is this because Norway is not in the European Union, or perhaps simply because they are not regarded by green groups as such easy targets as UK fishermen regularly are?

Cormac Burke



Here is Cormac's full story and editorial comment as broken in the last edition of Fishing News International:

Norway officials ‘cooking the books’ ? 

A Norwegian TV program claims cod export figures exceed reported landings by 20%   

A  new hard-hitting documentary program from Norway’s Broadcasting Corporation this  week titled “Cod Cheating” claimed that there is  “cheating and illegalities” in the Norwegian cod fisheries.  “There 's a bomb in the Norwegian fishery , a fishery which for many years has made the Scandinavian country the world's largest “clean and sustainable” fisheries,” the NRK  documentary stated. 

Claiming that far more cod is exported than reported legally landed, the ‘Cod Cheating’  program spoke with fish buyer Steinar Eliassen who said that Norway exports more than 15  to 20 percent  of cod above what official landings show.  “This was always happening to a small degree, but now it is much more than before,” he  said. 

Answering the accusation that there is talk of fraud in the region of several billion NOK , the  Norwegian Directorate of Fisheries have defended themselves by stating that export figures  cannot be directly compared to landing figures.

But higher up the administrative chain, Norway's fisheries minister Elisabeth Aspeaker  commented that something needs to be done urgently to get to the bottom of this problem. "It's very discouraging and very serious,” she said, adding “We cannot accepts this.” Ironically, this anomaly in the figures is not the fault of the fishermen, as they have been  logging their catches and landings correctly.

Several fishermen in the NRK documentary said that they felt cheated as it now transpires  that their weighing notes show considerably smaller figures than in reality Director Trygve Myrvang in Norwegian Raw Fish Organisation, the fishermen's own sales  organization, spoke of the anger of his membership at this revelation: “The good reputation of our industry is at risk unless we stop this illegalization of the cod  fishery. A kilo of fish shall be recorded as a kilo of fish.”   Not a good management policy

In an interview with Intrafish, renowned fisheries consultant Mogens Schou , ex advisor  to Denmark’s Minister of Fisheries and currently a partner in Aquamind - a consultancy  dedicated to align sound policy with growth in the fishing industry –said that there must  always be full accountability (no matter what country or fishery) all catches to count on  the quota and that they be documented and that this should be followed by removal of  prescriptive management.

“ Norway has consistently claimed that it has a management and control system of a quality  that practically forbid them to consider other options in the wake of technological, CFP and  market developments.   “This latest revelation would appear to point to the contrary,” he said. “Full accountability leads to better management, and nobody – not even Norway, should  exclude themselves from trials, development and innovation of the management system,”  he concluded.

THE BLAME GAME

However, prosecutors in Troms and Finnmark say that fishermen are not entirely innocent  and that there has been an increase in illegal logbook activities of up to 65% in 2012 - 2013. “For prosecutors, this is a well known problem. I have worked with this type of crime in  my entire career, chief public prosecutor Lars Faus told NRK. “In  many  cases  we  are  talking  about  deliberate  fraud,  where  both  fishermen  and  fish  buyer helps.

“When some fishermen come ashore as they are “in cahoots” with fish buyer and record  smaller quantities of fish on paper than they actually landed,” he added. The revelation that Norway’s squeaky clean image in its sustainable and strongly controlled  cod fishery could have serious ramifications for its export market – particularly in the UK  where several major retail chains insist on a regime of traceability and total sustainability of  the fisheries from which it sells its seafood products.