Saving Seafood

Brexit: French Fishermen Worry What A Trade Deal May Mean For Them

December 28, 2020 — With just days to go until Great Britain officially leaves the European Union’s single common market and customs union, the two sides appear close to a trade deal.

But there has been particular apprehension along a stretch of French coastline that is home to the massive cross-channel rail and ferry port of Calais, and Europe’s largest seafood processing platform. A dispute over fishing rights — a small but highly symbolic sector — has been one of the main sticking points to a trade deal between the EU and the United Kingdom.

Every morning at the English Channel port of Boulogne-sur-Mer, French trawlers pull up to the docks to unload their catch after fishing all night.

Laurent Merlin, a French fisherman, says he gets well over half his catch in British waters, where he says there are more fish. If there’s no deal and the French are banned from fishing in British waters, Merlin says he won’t survive.

Read the full story at NPR

Why Fishing Could Sink Britain’s Brexit Deal With Europe

October 7, 2020 — Twenty or so small boats, slung with orange floats and lobster pots and bearing banners reading “SAVE BRITAIN’S FISH” and “COASTAL COMMUNITIES COUNT,” chugged out of the harbor into the bay. The flotilla set off rockets and flares, and orange and white smoke billowed out over the English Channel. The unusual episode—part protest, part distress call—was replicated in port towns across Britain in April 2018. “You get pushed that far, you’ve got to do something,” Dave Pitman, 65, a third-generation trawlerman who took part in the demonstration, said in an interview this August.

At issue was the Common Fisheries Policy (CFP), a European Union agreement that gives European boats access to British waters and which, critics claim, has decimated the U.K.’s fishing industry. The country remains in the CFP while it negotiates its exit from the EU, which Fishing for Leave spokesman Arron Banks said in a statement at the time gives Europe the opportunity “to cull what’s left of the UK fleet.” He added, “Brexit creates a golden opportunity to regain 70 per cent of the UK’s fisheries resources and rejuvenate a multi-billion pound industry for the nation.”

Read the full story at Foreign Policy

Sustainability prioritized as UK government rolls out post-Brexit fisheries bill

January 29, 2020 — With the United Kingdom due to withdraw from the European Union on Friday, 31 January, new legislation has been introduced into U.K. parliament that creates the powers for the country to operate as an independent coastal state and to manage its fish stocks independently.

Beyond delivering a legal guarantee that the United Kingdom will leave the E.U.’s Common Fisheries Policy (CFP) at the end of the transition period in December 2020, and also ending the automatic rights for E.U. vessels to fish in British waters, the new fisheries bill contains provisions that take into account climate change’s impact on fisheries, as well as the new objective to move towards “climate-smart fishing” in U.K. waters.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

No-deal Brexit could destroy Britain’s fishing industry, warns seafood boss

January 31, 2019 — Britain’s fishing industry could be destroyed by a no-deal Brexit, a leading figure has warned.

The UK fishing industry has long been one of the biggest backers for Britain to leave Brussels but Graeme Sutherland, the director of Whitelink Seafoods, said fishing would not survive if Britain crashes out of the European Union.

‘As a company, we export into Europe at a rate of 85-90% of what we produce here,’ he told LBC.

‘We are working on a next-day delivery into France for distribution into Europe. So if we are delayed in any way in clearing customs, in effect, we are going to lose 24 hours on delivery.

‘We need frictionless borders. It has to be that for our industry to survive.’

Read the full story at Yahoo News

Fears Grow of New ‘Cod Wars’ Under No-Deal Brexit

January 14, 2019 — SEAFOOD NEWS — Fishermen worry that without terms of exit, European boats will test UK’s resolve to take back its territorial waters.

Newlyn, Cornwall – James Hellewell, a picture-book image of a bearded fisherman, contemplates what could happen in the high seas off the English peninsula Cornwall on the first day after a “hard Brexit”.

“Someone’s going to die,” Hellewell warns. “If a trawler has got its beams out and a Frenchman goes and hits it under the beam, he can turn that boat turtle.”

Hellewell, like many others in the fishing community of Newlyn in southwest Cornwall, fears European boats will test Britain’s resolve to take back control of its territorial waters if the United Kingdom leaves the European Union without an exit agreement on March 29.

The waters are currently shared by European fishermen under the EU’s Common Fisheries Policy, but once outside the EU, Britain will regain full control of fishing stocks unless its government reaches a deal with Brussels over the terms of its withdrawal.

Although many fishermen in Cornwall support Brexit, they want conditions put in place that will protect their livelihood and interests.

This story was originally published by SeafoodNews.com, a subscription site. It is reprinted with permission. 

Brexit Leaves French Fishermen On The Hook

September 12, 2017 — France’s busiest port, Boulougne-sur-Mer, sits just across the English Channel from Britain, in the Calais region.

Seagulls glide above scores of brightly painted boats docking to unload the catch of the day — mainly sole but also cod, roussette, crab and scallops.

It’s all sold at a bustling seaside market where Marie-Laure Fontaine sells seafood from a fishing boat called Providence.

“Sole and cod and turbot, we get these all from British waters,” Fontaine says. “And this is a worry.”

Up to 80 percent of fish caught by fishermen here comes from British waters, which are about a two-hour boat ride away.

French fishermen have been nervous since Britain voted to leave the European Union last year. That’s because when the divorce is final, the U.K. will also leave what’s called the Common Fisheries Policy.

“After that, the U.K. will be an independent coastal state, like Norway or the Faroe Islands or Iceland,” says Barrie Deas, chief executive of the U.K.’s National Federation Fishermen’s Organisations. “The U.K. will determine its own fishing quotas and access arrangements. So I think it’s realistic for the French to be worried.”

Read and listen to the full story at NPR

EU Discard Ban Stimulates Innovation and Improved Cross-Sectoral Communication

July 7, 2017 — The following is a report written by Dr. Bill Karp, Affiliate Professor at University of Washington:

The Common Fisheries Policy (CFP) governs fisheries management in the European Union and is, very roughly equivalent to the Magnuson-Stevens Act in the US. The CFP is updated (reformed) every ten years. Article 15 of the 2013 reform is entitled “Landing Obligation” and includes the following text:

  1. All catches of species which are subject to catch limits and, in the Mediterranean, also catches of species which are subject to minimum sizes as defined in Annex III to Regulation (EC) No 1967/2006, caught during fishing activities in Union waters or by Union fishing vessels outside Union waters in waters not subject to third countries’ sovereignty or jurisdiction, in the fisheries and geographical areas listed below shall be brought and retained on board the fishing vessels, recorded, landed and counted against the quotas where applicable, except when used as live bait, in accordance with the following time-frames:

For further details (including exceptions) see http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/PDF/?uri=CELEX:32013R1380&rid=1

This “Landing Obligation” or discard ban was enacted in response to public concerns regarding perceived wasteful practices. It is being implemented over several years, initially in the more industrialized, large scale fisheries of northern Europe. Many concerns about practicability, cost, and other aspects have been raised and hotly debated in Europe, but implementation is proceeding.

As expected, this change in public policy has directly impacted many aspects of fishing, handling, processing, and marketing. The EU has funded several projects designed to encourage cross-sectoral engagement to improve gear selectivity, share information on avoiding unwanted catch (spatial, areal, etc.), encourage advances in handling, stimulate marketing opportunities, etc. Among these initiatives is a project called “DiscardLess” which is a four-year, multi-million Euro project. Through this project, researchers and stakeholders from throughout Europe and elsewhere are working together to reduce discards in European fisheries. The DiscardLess Consortium includes 31 partners from 20 countries.

Participants include fishermen, gear technologists, economists, handling, processing and marketing experts, and marine scientists. Work packages within the project focus on selectivity, avoidance, optimal use, ecosystem considerations, and policy aspects. Work began more than two years ago, and some important results are already apparent. For example, the Atlas, and Selectivity Manual provide broad-based and comprehensive information, much of which will be useful to US fishermen. See http://www.discardless.eu/ to download these products and learn more about the DiscardLess project. For an excellent short video about DiscardLess, see https://player.vimeo.com/video/206395350

A spat about seafood shows the compromises that Brexit will force

July 5, 2017 — Britain’s fishing industry is a tiddler, contributing less than 0.1% of GDP. But the island nation has great affection for its fleet. During last year’s Brexit referendum campaign, a flotilla of trawlermen steamed up the Thames to protest against European Union fishing quotas. On July 2nd Michael Gove, the Brexiteer environment secretary (who claims that his father’s Aberdeen fish business was sunk by EU rules), announced that Britain would “take back control” of its waters by unilaterally withdrawing from an international fishing treaty.

Gutting such agreements is strongly supported by coastal communities. The pro-Brexit press cheered Mr Gove’s bold announcement. But landing a new deal for British fishermen will be legally complex, expensive to enforce, oblige Britain to observe European rules that it has had no hand in setting and, most likely, leave its businesses and consumers worse off than before. It is, in other words, a case study of the Brexit negotiations as a whole.

The EU’s Common Fisheries Policy (CFP) was drawn up before Britain joined, to its disadvantage. But membership has allowed Britain to improve the policy. Countries’ quotas are now set on a basis that is more scientific than political. Unwanted fish can no longer be discarded at sea, which has helped to reverse the depletion of stocks.

Unpicking decades of tangled legal agreements will be harder than it looks. Mr Gove has initiated Britain’s withdrawal from the London Fisheries Convention. But Michel Barnier, the European Commission’s Brexit negotiator, argues that this 1964 agreement has since been superseded by the CFP. Regardless of these conventions, foreign fishermen may claim historic fishing rights going back decades or even centuries. Many of them have set up units in Britain to buy quotas from British fishermen. Unless the government overturns these property rights by decree, it may face a large compensation bill.

Read the full story at The Economist

EU Calls for Better Enforcement of Fisheries Laws

April 26, 2017 — The European Commission has released a new review of its fisheries control regulation, which was adopted in 2009. While EU member states have put most of the regulation’s measures into effect, the EC said, many have not yet fully implemented it.

“Our evaluation . . . showed that more needs to be done to fully implement certain provisions. It is also clear that the current legislative framework is not entirely fit for purpose,” said commissioner for environment, maritime affairs and fisheries Karmenu Vella.

Many of the regulation’s objectives have been achieved, including national-level Fishing Monitoring Centers; national control programs; surveillance and tracking measures; and improved data collection and reporting. Compliance with the rules of the Common Fisheries Policy (CFP) is also up. However, the EC found that not all national fisheries authorities use the regulation’s enforcement tools consistently, and the regulations for small vessels (under 10 meters) are poorly implemented across the board.

Data obtained by environmental lawyers ClientEarth showed minimal use of the regulation’s punitive enforcement measures by certain member states. The NGO asserts that legal penalties are being assessed too infrequently, especially in Northern European nations, and the penalties that are imposed are often too mild to serve as an effective deterrent. As an example, ClientEarth found that about 90 percent of fisheries enforcement cases in France in 2014 were settled out of court, many with fines in the low four figures.

Read the full story at The Maritime Executive

EU fisheries chief outlines first multi-annual management plan for the Mediterranean

March 9, 2017 — European Union Commissioner for Environment, Fisheries and Maritime Affairs, Karmenu Vella, has presented a multi-annual plan for small pelagic fish stocks in the Adriatic Sea.

The proposal, which covers four different small pelagic stocks but is focused on anchovy and sardine – the most commercially valuable fishery – is the third multi-annual plan that the European Commission (EC) is putting forward since the reform of the Common Fisheries Policy (CFP). It is also the first ever in the Mediterranean and if fully implemented has the potential to increase stocks by 20 percent.

This will bring tangible improvements in the working conditions for fishermen, with an expected increase in salary of approximately five percent and profits of around 10 percent.

According to the EC, the plan marks a milestone in its approach to fisheries management, and shows that long-term viability of fisheries can still be made possible in a sea basin in which 93 percent of the fish stocks are assessed as over-exploited.

Without this plan, anchovy and sardine stocks would most likely collapse between 2020 and 2030, said Vella.

Read the full story at Seafood Source