October 7, 2025 — The International Council for the Exploration of the Seas (ICES) is recommending big cuts to quotas of pelagic species in the Northeast Atlantic, continuing a downward trend amid continued overfishing.
ICES recommended the blue whiting catch in the Northeast Atlantic should be dropped to no more than 1.88 billion pounds (851,344 MT) in 2026, a 41 percent decrease from the 3.20 billion pounds (1.45 million MT) quota it recommended for 2025. The drop for Northeast Atlantic mackerel was even more severe, with ICES recommending a nearly 70 percent drop from the 1.27 billion pounds (576,958 MT) recommended for the 2025 season to a quota of just 384 million pounds (174,357 MT) in 2026.