The main issues of the fisheries section of the Brexit negotiations will be access by EU vessels to UK waters and the UK’s dependence on the European market for the sale of its seafood products.
That is the principal conclusion of a round table on the fisheries aspects of Brexit, organised in Brussels on Wednesday 22 March on the initiative of the European Fisheries Alliance (EUFA) which brought together MEPs and fisheries representatives from several countries, including Spain, France, the Netherlands, Belgium and Denmark.
The fisheries sector will be one of the most affected by Brexit, stated the chair of the European Parliament fisheries committee, Alain Cadec (EPP, France), who chaired the round table. He said, however, that he was certain that “a sound compromise will be reached, a win-win agreement” on the fisheries section of the Brexit talks. He said that two main points should be borne in mind. The first is free access for EU vessels to UK waters. At present, European fishermen are able to fish in UK waters and some European fleets are more than 50% dependent on catches in those waters¸ Cadec stated. “Ending access to those waters would have potentially serious socio-economic consequences”, he warned. The second point is access for British fisheries products to the European market. Around 65% of UK fisheries products are exported duty-free to the rest of the EU market. “These two issues are intimately linked”, he argued.
Leaving the CFP. This view was not at all shared by MEP Ian Duncan (ECR, UK). He does “not believe that access to UK waters and access to the EU market are inseparable”. He argued that the UK also has the right to seek higher fisheries quotas and that Brexit could provide the opportunity for reform of the common fisheries policy (CFP). British fishermen are quite clear: they want to leave the CFP and will claim a “fair” share of fishing opportunities, Duncan said. A representative of the Spanish fishing industry challenged that point of view and pointed out that the current allocation of fishing quotas reflected the balance that prevailed prior to the UK’s accession to the EU in 1973.
EU countries 30% dependent on UK waters. EUFA President Gerard van Balsfoort stressed that the UK and the rest of the EU are interdependent: nine EU countries depend on UK waters for their catches (33.7% of the catches of these nine countries are made in UK waters and, for the Dutch and German fleets, the figure rises to over 50%) and 20% by volume of British landings are made outside UK waters, including 17% in EU countries. Van Balsfoort gave some indication of the effects of a “hard” Brexit on the fisheries sector: - in the short term, a 50% fall in the net profits of fishing fleets and a 15% fall in fishermen’s wages; - in the long term, a 15% reduction in the number of EU vessels (500-600 fewer vessels) and the loss of 2,500-3,000 full-time jobs on fishing vessels. (Original version in French by Lionel Changeur)