• Resources

  • All Wikis

• News

  • CH (2,604)
  • CZ (99)
  • DE (557)
  • EN (4,235)
  • ES (65)
  • FR (106)
  • HU (7)
  • IL (687)
  • IT (1,810)
  • NO (101)
  • PL (289)
  • PT (9)
  • RU (5,118)
  • SE (6)
  • TR (20)
  • UA (2,615)

Jesús Etchevers, president of the Shipowners Association of A Coruña. (Photo: StockFile)

Galician shipowners alarmed by discard ban

SPAIN


Tuesday, June 04, 2013, 02:50 (GMT + 9)

Ship owners of Gran Sol fleet ensure that theirs is one of the fleets which will be most affected by the ban on discards set under an agreement with negotiators of the Council of the European Union (EU).

For the Galician fleet, the agreement is “unfortunate” and a “total nonsense,” the newspaper La Opinión informed.

According to the president of the Association of Shipowners from A Coruña (Arpesco), Jesus Etchevers, the covenant on discards implies “the end” for most vessels from Gran Sol.

“There may be as many as 20 ships,” predicted the fishing leader.

The community standard will force ships to take the bycatch to the land, even though some of them contribute to the “putrefaction” of the species of interest to fishermen originally from Galicia, he explained

Added to this is the fact that if fishermen catch a species for which they are not authorized, a discount will be performed from the quota they have for others.

“So the activity of vessels will not last more than two or three months,” complains Etchevers.

For Arpesco president, it is necessary to require authorities to denounce the issue in the EU Court of Justice.

Meanwhile, the artisanal sector is “expecting” to know how the reform of the Common Fisheries Policy (CFP) will affect it.

In this regard, the president of the Association of Small-Scale Shipowners of Galicia (Asoar-Armega), Jose Luis Rodriguez, pointed out: “We demand the definition of artisanal vessel to be changed, the vessel length to be increased up to 15 metres and vessels engaged single day trips to be included.”

For the leader, if the final text does not reflect this item, there will be “discrimination” of small boats and a “failure” of the CFP reform.

Furthermore, the ban on trawling would reduce the Galician fleet catches by 12,000 tonnes, but French and Portuguese vessels will be affected.

The limitation would mostly affect the black halibut, grenadier, ling and bream.

At present, the fleets of Spain, France and Portugal fish about 60 per cent of these resources. France accounts for 20.41 per cent of the quotas for these species, Spain concentrates 19.72 per cent and Portugal 18.30 per cent.

Meanwhile, the UK provides 14.19 per cent and Germany 12.10 per cent. The Netherlands, Denmark, Ireland and Poland have percentages that are under 10 per cent.

According to the data provided by Galician shipowners, the fisheries of the Spanish fleet that would suffer more intensely the possible ban would be those of black halibut (4,275 tonnes), grenadier (2,643 tonnes), ling (2,211 tonnes), forkbead (830 tonnes), bluegill (779 tonnes), blue ling (318 tonnes), black sable (186 tonnes), alfonsino (70 tonnes) and tusk (46 tonnes).

The Cooperative of Shipowners of the Port of Vigo (ARVI) fears that the new measures will lead to a further reduction of its associated fleet, which in the last five years lost about 30 fishing vessels. These ships were scrapped or changed flag for another one belonging to foreign countries in order to get fishing quotas, Diario Atlántico reported.

Related article:

– CFP reform breeds measures to stop overfishing and discards

By Analia Murias
editorial@fis.com
www.fis.com

 Print

Comments