The Fisheries Committee of the European Parliament (EP) adopted today a report reacting to the Commission communication "A policy to reduce unwanted by-catches and eliminate discards in European fisheries". According to the Members of the European Parliametn (MEPs), the most sensible way to proceed is by choosing a number of pilot fisheries, based upon the quantity of discards produced or on the conservation status of the species involved. Two possible candidates would be the various beam trawl fisheries and those fisheries that catch and discard cod.
By-catches and discards are a serious ecological and economic problem. On the one hand they are responsible for the imbalance seen in some ecosystems, and on the other hand they have been identified as the main cause of the depletion of stocks, some of them with a high commercial value, such as cod. Discards have been estimated to be between 7 million and 27 million tonnes per year worldwide, equivalent to one quarter of all fish and other species caught.
In the report, the Fisheries Committee welcomes the Commission's new attempt to stimulate discussion about this serious subject with a view to finally shifting the emphasis of the Common Fisheries Policy (CFP) so that the practice of discarding is ultimately eliminated.
According to MEPs, one effective action to reduce discards is a reduction in overall fishing effort, accompanied by an improvement in selective measures. They recognize that "reduced fishing pressure would provide significant benefits for the industry" by allowing depleted stocks to recover and become more productive as well as saving time and effort in sorting the catch.
Incentives for the industry to improve its fishing practices
The Fisheries Committee encourages the Commission, the Member States and other stakeholders to consider the "use of incentives for the industry to improve its fishing practices", mentioning various possibilities for such incentives, including:
allowing more days at sea or increasing the allowable fishing time, for vessels using more selective gear;
providing preferential access for vessels using selective gear to areas that are closed to those vessels not using selective gear;
allowing vessels with more selective gear to fish during times when others are not allowed.
"The industry would respond more favourably and with greater effect to a combination of positive and negative incentives, which should be given an opportunity to produce results", says Carl SCHLYTER, iMEP in charge of the report, adding that "a discard ban should be adopted only after other types of negative incentives have been tried, including timed series of increases in mesh sizes, closed areas and others".
Pilot projects
According to the committee, the most sensible way to proceed is by choosing a number of pilot fisheries, based upon the quantity of discards produced or on the conservation status of the species involved. The pilot projects should be selected in several zones to represent the geographical variety of Community fisheries. Each pilot project must also involve a sufficient number of vessels to cover the diversity of the fishery as well as to ensure good information exchange with others in the fishery.
MEPs suggest that two possible candidate fisheries would be the various beam trawl fisheries as well as those fisheries that catch and discard cod. While these pilot projects are proceeding, other fisheries should be evaluated for their discard rate.
