European bycatch regulations

Some 700 EU fishing vessels operate in the waters of developing states under EU Fishing Agreements. These vessels target a variety of species, including shrimp, tuna, and cephalopods (including squid and octopus), and employ an array of fishing gears. Three of these gears are associated with high levels of bycatch:

• Bottom Trawling


• Longlining


• Purse seines

Whilst domestically the EU has attempted to minimize the destructive environmental effects of commercial fishing by setting out strictly defined criteria governing fishing gear, bycatch limits, and regulations obliging fishers to use bycatch reduction devices (for example, certain cod fisheries in the Baltic Sea), EU Fishing Agreement regulations, by comparison, are both inadequate and much less rigorous, thereby allowing considerable opportunity for fleets to fish unselectively (i.e. with higher bycatch levels).

Bycatch limits are only specified in a minority of EU Fishing Agreements with developing counties, and when they are included there often are no penalties for exceeding these limits. In some cases where bycatch limits are specified, EU vessels are permitted to catch far more bycatch than the equivalent domestic vessels. For example, under the EU's fishing agreement with the Republic of Guinea EU trawlers are allowed to catch almost five times more bycatch than a Guinean national trawler.

High bycatch levels have serious implications for sustainable exploitation of fish stocks, particularly in places like the Gulf of Guinea, where bycatch can contain a high level of juveniles. This can cause commercially and locally important fish stocks to collapse, endangering the food security of local people and incurring serious economic costs on developing countries.

Considering the numerous prior commitments the EU has made towards ensuring the sustainable exploitation of fisheries in developing states, there can be few excuses for failing to address the issue of selectivity in the EU's distant water fleet.

Considering the numerous prior commitments the EU has made to ensuring the sustainable development of fisheries in developing states, there can be few excuses for failing to address the issue of selectivity in the EU's distant water fleet.

It is EJF's position that all EU vessels should be subject to a similar set of legally-binding bycatch provisions, as there can be little justification for the EU to accept different bycatch standards for fisheries in the North Sea, for example, than for European vessels fishing off West Africa, or on the high seas.

The EU currently has fishing agreements with 15 developing countries (Cape Verde, the Comoros, Côte d'Ivoire, Gabon, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Kiribati, Madagascar, Mauritania, the Federated States of Micronesia, Morocco (starting in 2006), Mozambique, São Tomé and Principe, the Seychelles and the Solomon Islands) which are intended to give the EU rights to the "surplus" marine resources of these countries in return for financial compensation (ranging from around €400,000 to €86,000,000 per country per year). Over the past five years the annual compensation payments made through fisheries agreements have averaged around €150 million.

These arrangements benefit the EU by helping to fulfil domestic demand for seafood, as many EU stocks are over-exploited and 60% of fish must be imported. They are also responsible for maintaining 40,000 jobs in Europe. It is estimated that EU fishing agreements generate value added of €768 million in member states through the processing and marketing of fish caught in developing country waters. This essentially means that for every euro of EU public spending, a turnover of roughly €3 is created. Most of the benefits of EU agreements with African and Pacific states accrue to Spanish operators, which obtain over 80% of the added value and jobs. France and Portugal benefit from around 7%.

While fishing agreements are clearly hugely beneficial to the fishing industry of certain EU member states, there are serious concerns regarding their sustainability. Almost 70% of African fisheries between Morocco and the Congo - a region where the EU has six such agreements to fish - are fully developed or in decline. As developing countries rely on Fishing Agreements as a source of much-needed foreign currency, at times access has been given to fish stocks that are already fully exploited or overexploited, in full contradiction of the stipulation that agreements should only exploit excess stocks. Fishing practices under the agreements are also often environmentally damaging, with inadequate regulations governing fishing gear selectivity. In many of the agreements, no catch limits are specified, meaning that the catches and impacts of the EU fleet are underestimated. Furthermore, fishing access is subsidised, so EU fleets can often out-compete domestic fisheries. Currently most benefits of fishing agreements are hugely skewed in the EU’s favour, and as consequence developing countries are losing present and future opportunities to make the most of their fisheries.

If fisheries access agreements are negotiated they should respect and entrench the provisions of the FAO Code of Conduct for Responsible Fisheries. Access to stocks that are already fully exploited or showing signs of over-exploitation (based on the best scientific advice available) should not be on the negotiating table, and all targeted stocks should be subject to yearly assessments. EU vessels fishing under an access agreement must be subject to the same regulations governing types of fishing gears, bycatch levels, turtle excluder devices (TEDs) etc. as those fishing in EU waters; bycatch reporting should be compulsory, with both bycatch and discards quotas set. The use of Vessel Monitoring Systems (VMS) should be systematically required, and the access agreement should provide for support to improve the monitoring, control and surveillance capacity of the host country. Where EU vessels are involved in IUU fishing, these individual vessels should be immediately struck from the list of vessels allowed to fish under the agreement.

With the goal of long term viability and sustainability of fisheries in developing countries, measures should be put in place to safeguard and develop local fisheries with a medium-term goal of ending EU access agreements in favour of domestic exploitation of fisheries resources. Given their vital importance to local livelihoods and food security, small-scale fisheries (artisanal/subsistence) must be protected. There should be the development of a local capacity to process fish caught by local and EU vessels, including support for the development of crucial linfrastructure (dedicated port, cold store etc), and a value-added industry. These efforts should be accompanied by EU support and training by the relevant EU body (Directorate-General for Health and Consumer Affairs) to the relevant competent body in the country to ensure that it meets health and hygiene standards allowing domestic fish catches to be sold onto the lucrative European market.