Balticsea 2020

Fishery: EU fisheries ministers voted on the reform of the Common Fisheries Policy

This week media has reported on a historical decision in EU when in December 18, the members of the European Parliament, fisheries committee, voted on the reform of the Common Fisheries Policy (CFP). For the first time the the members of the committee voted that the reform of the CFP shall rebuild the fish stock and simplify the management of the fishery. The result, 13 for and 10 against, is indicative for how the EU will vote in plenary, probably in March 2013. Mr. Jacob Hagberg, project leader Fishery BalticSea2020, says that “the outcome of Tuesday’s vote is a great step in the right direction to curb short-term decisions and instead rebuild fish stocks and lay the foundation for a viable fishery."

This year (2012) BalticSea2020 has disseminating knowledge among politicians in the EU, of current management models that have demonstrably improved the marine environment and increased the fisheries’ profitability. The voted proposition includes three of the four main parts BalticSea2020 stated:

• Imposing a minimum level on the size of fish stocks, to ensure that stocks are sustainable and profitable fishing can be conducted (known as Maximum Sustainable Yield - MSY level). Fish stocks should have reached this level by 2020.
• That all fish that is caught are landed (discard bans) and counted against the yearly fish-quota instead of today, where large amounts of fish are thrown back dead into the sea. This is also likely to lead to simplified fishing rules for the fishing industry and more opportunities to develop their own fisheries.
• A regionalization of the CFP so that the EU sets targets for the management, while regions such as the Baltic States together, decide the detail management of sea areas and on the best methods for achieving these goals. An example of regionalization is the agreement that Sweden, Denmark and Norway have made about being frontrunners and introduce discard ban in Skagerrak early as 2014.
• Unfortunately they voted against those parts of the proposal that was supposed to help reduce overcapacity in the EU fleet. Overcapacity leads to reduced profitability, which in turn pushes governments to allow overfishing. BalticSea2020 also believe that direct subsidies to fishing will be phased out because they generally increase the capacity and thus counteracts fisheries management, but even this was voted off.

- The outcome of Tuesday's vote is a great step in the right direction to curb short-term decisions and instead rebuild fish stocks and to lay the foundations for a viable fishery. Much work remains before the proposal is adopted in the EU and then requires a commitment from EU member states and fishermen, to put the law into practice management, says Jacob Hagberg, Project Fishing BalticSea2020.