EU Fails to Tighten Rules for Mediterranean Fishing
Date: 21-Sep-05
Country: BELGIUM
With species like sardines, hake and swordfish disappearing after years of overfishing, the proposed new regulation aimed to make fishermen use nets with larger holes so that younger fish have a better chance to escape.
The rules also set minimum distances for trawlers from the coastal zones that are home to sensitive wildlife and fish habitats. Opposition to the proposed regulation was led by France and Italy, which complained of the threat to the local industries whose livelihoods depend on small-scale fishing.
"We have been talking about the need for a management regime in the Mediterranean for 15 years," UK Fisheries Minister Ben Bradshaw told a news conference after the meeting had broken up.
"It is a real pity that we failed to reach an agreement today. I think that is a crisis for fisheries management in the Mediterranean," he said.
Spain, Italy, Portugal, France and Greece all fish in the Mediterranean as do EU newcomers Cyprus, Malta and Slovenia. More than 100,000 fishermen make their living from the Mediterranean, using mostly small boats, and there is much recreational fishing.
Much Mediterranean fishing is practised close to coastlines due to the narrowness of the sea's continental shelf, and this is where younger fish tend to congregate.
Species such as hake, swordfish, octopus and sardines -- firm favourites on dinner tables in many Mediterranean countries -- are on the danger list, scientists say.
More exotic species like the musky and horned octopus and spiny lobster are also threatened and catches have slumped since the mid-1990s. In the Adriatic and strait of Sicily, catches for some species are 60 percent lower than they were 20 years ago.
The EU says it cannot save Mediterranean fish stocks from collapse on its own, since the region is an international fishing zone that is bordered by many other non-EU countries.
The European Commission, author of the new rules, offered a series of last-minute technical amendments to the Mediterranean countries to persuade them to accept the new rules, in vain.
"We reached the end of our possibilities of trying to find a compromise solution," said EU Fisheries Commissioner Joe Borg.
