Setting up a light at the end of the tunnel for threatened sharks, but doing little to reduce catches of other deep-sea species, EU fisheries ministers concluded a long day of quota haggling at the November Council meeting.
The Council decision on the sharks implies a by-catch ban by 2012, heralded by Commissioner Maria Damanaki as “very good news”.
“Sharks will be protected. Totally protected”, she emphatically stated at a press conference after the November 29 meeting.
Total Allowable Catches (TACs) for the deep-sea species are determined only biannually, in accordance with the period for which scientific advice is given by the International Council for the Exploration of the Sea (ICES), then reviewed by the Commission’s scientific advisory body STECF ( the Scientific, Technical and Economical Committee for Fisheries).
In its press release summarising the November meeting, the Council admitted that indications are “that most deep-sea stocks are in a precarious situation, and that fishing opportunities for those stocks, in order to assure their sustainability, should be reduced until the evolution of the stock sizes show a positive trend”.
As the matter of fact ICES has declared that the whole deep-sea catch comes from stocks “outside safe biological limits”. Another major problem is the lack of good scientific data on these stocks. Deep-sea fishes are particularly susceptible to overexploitation due to some biological characteristics – long lived but slow-growing, low reproductive capacity.
Although environmental groups – including FISH and its partner in preparing background letters to the ministers prior to their meetings Seas At Risk – had criticised the Commission’s proposal for not going far enough, the Council set even higher TACs for 2011-2012.
The decision “gambled that deep-sea stocks will survive another two years of overfishing”, Seas At Risk said in a statement.
“Given the complete uncertainty about the sustainability of these fisheries and the indications that deep sea stocks are in a bad shape, it is far from clear that the stocks can cope with the levels of fishing agreed”, remarked SAR Executive Director Monica Verbeek.
“Ministers should have taken their commitments under several UN instruments seriously, and agree to a progressive phase out of catches unless or until measures are in place that ensure sustainable exploitation. Instead they fall into their annual habit of disregarding scientific advice and to keep on fishing, appeasing those countries that profit most. Deep water fish species are too vulnerable and their recovery too slow to sustain such a habit.”
According to reports, especially Great Britain, Sweden, the Netherlands and Germany had been raising concerns that there a need for greater caution regarding the deep-sea species
Over lunch, the fisheries ministers discussed several issues bearing on the upcoming reform of the Common Fisheries Policy (CFP), including a Presidency seminar in Ostend earlier in the month that dealt with the conflict between scientific and industry interests.
The Belgian fisheries minister Kris Peeters, who chairs the Council meetings until 1 January, declared at the press conference that all member nations had agreed that the RACs – the Regional Advisory Councils, stakeholder representations that are heavily dominated by the sector – should be “strengthened”, and that it is very important “to get the sector involved as we create scientific advice”. He added that there is a need to make sure “that the views of the various scientific bodies are better coordinated”.
Commissioner Damanaki added that studies on deep-sea issues will be launched, and that “we will give more money to scientific research, so I hope that when we are coming back to decide on deep-sea fishing opportunities in two years, we will have clear scientific advice to base it on”.
On another point, the ministers heard a report on the first round of the annual quota negotiations with Norway, the second round to start later that same day. The Council press release remarked that the “strong reduction” of the TAC for blue whiting makes it hard for the Union to find elements to trade in exchange of higher quotas on Arctic cod proposed by Norway.