Commission acknowledges it will be difficult to phase out overfishing by 2020 deadline

In a discussion paper on fishing possibilities for 2019, adopted on Monday 11 June, the European Commission acknowledges it will not be easy to phase out overfishing by 2020 (see EUROPE 12025, 12010).

The Commission’s main objective is to achieve “significant further progress” in 2019 towards reaching maximum sustainable yield for fishing (FMSY), as this is the last year before the FMSY objective of 2020, it is stated in the document on 2019 quotas.

The Union has made important progress, the Commission notes, acknowledging that it will be a challenge to ensure that all total allowable catches (TAC) are in line with FMSY by 2020.

For both biological and socio-economic reasons, it may not be possible to have all stocks fished at FMSY simultaneously, admits the department under Fisheries Commissioner Karmenu Vella.  The number of TAC in line with FMSY increased in 2018, from 44 to 53, which represents no more than 69% of EU TACs.

The EU is lagging behind, says Oceana.  The NGO Oceana considers the EU is still far from its target to phase out overfishing by 2020.  Data show that overfishing levels remain high in the North East Atlantic “where 41% of stocks have been excessively harvested”.  In the Mediterranean, the situation is disastrous: 90% of fish stocks are overfished.  The NGO states that European hake, red mullet, blue whiting and anglerfish are all fished at levels around 10 times higher than what is considered sustainable by science.

Another challenge is the landing obligation.  As of 2019, EU rules on the landing obligation should be fully applied.  This is already the case for pelagic fisheries and Baltic Sea fishing.  For demersal fisheries, there has been an overall increase of the scope of the landing obligation in volume from 35% to 44% since 2017.  The Commission acknowledges that additional effort will be necessary and regrets the fact that countries have made such little use of the European Maritime and Fisheries Fund to help fisheries comply with the new rules, worth a total of €49 million.  (Original version in French by Lionel Changeur)