Conservation organisation Oceana has expressed disappointment as a seminar organised by the European Commission and the Mediterranean Advisory Council (MEDAC) to discuss the state of fish stocks in the Mediterranean ends with no concrete decisions.
Oceana has accused EU member states of having a passive attitude with regard its duty to end overfishing by 2020.
“The time for mere talking has now passed,” explains Lasse Gustavsson, executive director of Oceana in Europe. “96% of Mediterranean stocks managed by the EU are overfished, including species such as hake and red mullet, which are currently in a substantially worse situation that bluefin tuna before its recovery plan”.
“Drastic action is therefore possible, and we expect the European Commission and EU states to quickly come up with concrete actions to stop this senseless overfishing in the Mediterranean,” he concluded.
Oceana states that some scientists have described the Mediterranean as the most overfished and the worse managed sea area in the world and has called for the immediate emergency closure of all heavily overfished stocks, such as hake, and also those which are currently unable to fulfil the legally binding deadline to reach sustainable levels by 2020.
Other measures that Oceana has urged the EU to take include reducing fishing mortality and basing catch and effort limits on best available science; protecting nursery and spawning grounds; protecting juveniles; improving selectivity of fishing gears and improving monitoring, control and compliance.
