On Friday 26 July, the European Commission criticised the effectiveness of the Entry/Exit scheme applied to the EU fishing fleet.
In accordance with Regulation 1380/2013 on the Common Fisheries Policy (CFP), the Commission shall evaluate, by 30 December 2018 at the latest, the Entry/Exit scheme in light of changes in the relationship between fleet capacity and fishing opportunities and shall propose, if necessary, an amendment to that scheme.
The Commission has just adopted (with delay) its report on the evaluation of this complex scheme: Member States manage entries into and exits from their fleets in such a way that entries of new capacity that have not received public aid are compensated by the prior withdrawal, without public aid, of at least equivalent capacity.
The Commission considers that the still high number of unbalanced fleet segments in EU waters shows that, overall, “Member States have not yet fully reached their long-term objective of achieving a stable and enduring balance between their fishing fleet capacity and fishing opportunities available to them”. It is necessary, according to the Commission, to have an instrument to ensure that the EU fishing fleet capacity “cannot increase”.
To read the report: https://bit.ly/2K4jW1V (Original version in French by Lionel Changeur)