June 12, 2020 — The world is unlikely to meet a United Nations sustainable development goal on ending overfishing, according to the U.N. Food and Agricultural Organization’s recent report on the state of the world fisheries.
But the U.N.’s blunt admission that the world’s failing to meet SDG Target 14.4 – to end overfishing of marine fisheries by 2020 – has not prevented the European Union from declaring a victory of sorts in ending overfishing in its own territories.
June 3, 2020 — The additional EUR 500 million (USD 560.3 million) – added to the European Maritime Fisheries Fund (EMFF) last week – will strengthen the recovery and resilience of the E.U.’s fisheries sector as the region’s economy slowly reopens, according to European Commissioner for Environment, Oceans, and Fisheries, Virginijus Sinkevičius.
The additional funding, which is part of the Commission’s Recovery Package, represents an increase of more than 8 percent compared to the budget initially proposed for the EMFF in 2018.
May 28, 2020 — Britain’s chief Brexit negotiator said it was unlikely that Britain and the EU would finalise a fisheries agreement by a July deadline on Wednesday, as Michel Barnier offered UK opposition parties an extension of up to two years on the transition period.
“I am beginning to think we might not make it by the 30th of June,” David Frost told MPs on parliament’s Brexit scrutiny committee the week before the next round of negotiations with the EU.
“We don’t regard fisheries as something that can be traded for any other bits of the negotiation. There is something very important happening at the end of the year which is that we get back control of our own waters,” he said
“Any agreements have simply got to accommodate that reality,” Boris Johnson’s top Brexit official said, as he described the divisions over the issue between the two sides.
May 27, 2020 — The EU is willing to shift its stance on fisheries in negotiations with Britain next week, sources said, in what would be the first major concession from the bloc in talks on their new relationship after Brexit.
Fishing is particularly politically sensitive for France, and the 27-nation bloc says it would not seal a new trade deal with Britain without a stable agreement on that issue.
Currently, fishing mostly takes place in UK waters but most of the catch goes to European Union fishermen.
Britain wants to unwind that after Brexit materialises at the start of next year, saying that, as a newly independent coastal state, it wants to be in control of its waters and fish.
But the EU has so far sought to maintain the status quo, a demand an official with the bloc suggested was a primarily starting point for negotiations.
May 21, 2020 — World Trade Organization negotiations aimed at cutting billions of dollars in subsidies that contribute to overfishing have been suspended due to opposition from some countries that are too preoccupied with COVID-19, an internal document showed.
In an email to WTO delegates, chair Santiago Wills said some members were “unable to engage in negotiation discussions due to their need to combat COVID-19 pandemic domestically” as well as movement restrictions.
“It is fair to say that the Group as a whole is not ready to fully engage while still facing these struggles,” the email sent on May 7 said. Wills declined to comment.
It was not clear exactly which countries objected although a trade official said the African, Caribbean and Pacific States Group had raised doubts.
May 1, 2020 — Brexit trade negotiations face collapse unless the EU abandons its demands for continued access to UK fishing waters, sources close to the talks have said.
Brussels has called for EU boats to keep access under “existing conditions” as a price for the free trade agreement being negotiated by the two sides. The UK insists any fishing agreement must be separate from the trade deal with access negotiated annually in a similar fashion to Norway’s agreement with the bloc.
A UK source close to the negotiations said that the EU’s red line would need to change, otherwise the talks could be terminated in June.
“There are some fundamentals that we’re not going to change, nor going to move on. Because they are not so much negotiating positions as they’re sort of what an independent state does” the source said.
April 16, 2020 — The COVID-19 pandemic has had a monumental impact on global seafood trade.
Fishing fleets are tied up and fish farmers are facing an ever-increasing biomass in their cages, ponds, and tanks. Transport links all over the world have been severed, restaurants have closed, and supermarkets have either abandoned or reduced their fresh seafood offerings.
April 3, 2020 — A new set of measures designed to help the European Union’s fisheries and aquaculture sectors deal with the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic has been proposed by the European Commission through the European Maritime and Fisheries Fund (EMFF).
With fishers forced to stay in port and fish farmers facing the prospect of having to dispose of unused products, the E.C. said the new measures could provide immediate aid during the coronavirus crisis.
March 24, 2020 — Acknowledging that fishing and aquaculture have been “among the hardest hit” sectors by the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic, the European Commission has introduced a temporary state aid framework that enables E.U. member states to provide financial support to affected operators.
Seafood demand across the bloc has declined dramatically in recent weeks as retailers, restaurants, canteens, and other large-scale buyers have been reducing or temporarily closing down their activities. At the same time, supply chains have been affected by various logistical disruptions.
March 20, 2020 — Taking back control of fisheries became one of the totemic issues uniting supporters of the campaign for the UK to leave the EU. The issue will again be high on the agenda when the negotiations over the future relationship between the UK and EU are able to take place.
This will turn on the principles of freedom of access to territorial waters, and the rules governing how the EU’s total allowable catch is divided between member states. Both are enshrined in the EU Common Fisheries Policy, and the fishing quotas have been fixed since 1983. Referred to as “relative stability,” these permit a disproportionate amount of fishing in UK waters. Vessels from other EU member states are estimated to catch eight times as much fish from UK waters as the other way around.
The UK government has indicated that getting a better deal for British fishers will be a red line in the negotiations. In particular, it proposes that access to UK waters should be licensed and quota shares should be negotiated annually based on “zonal attachments,” which are the proportions of international fish stocks that reside the 200-mile area off the coast of a country, known as the exclusive economic zone.