Ports in the North-East Atlantic Fisheries Commission area, where landings of certain pelagic stocks in excess of 10 tonnes occur, will have to install landing monitoring systems, according to the position of the European Parliament’s Committee on Fisheries, which on Wednesday 23 January adopted (15 votes in favour, 9 against and 2 abstentions) a draft report by Francisco Guerreiro (Greens/EFA, Portuguese) amending the European Commission’s initial proposal.
The proposal aims to transpose into Community law new management, conservation and control rules for the area covered by the North-East Atlantic Fisheries Commission (NEAFC). MEPs also adopted the mandate to begin inter-institutional negotiations.
According to the amended text, the obligation to land certain pelagic stocks in the ports of five of the six members of this regional fisheries organisation – Norway, the EU, the Faroe Islands and Greenland, Iceland and the United Kingdom – should be controlled by cameras and detection technologies (when landings exceed 10 tonnes of pelagic species and more than 3,000 tonnes of these stocks are weighed in per calendar year). Small-scale fisheries are exempt from these rules. Member States must submit a list of their ports that meet these requirements. The new rules will apply from January 2026. (Original version in French by Lionel Changeur)