The NGO Environmental Action Germany (DUH), with the support of the Environmental Justice Foundation (EJF), announced, on Wednesday 24 June, that it had brought legal proceedings against bottom trawling in the German Schleswig-Holstein Wadden Sea National Park. Following a complaint filed in 2025 with the European Commission, the two organisations are now bringing the case before the Schleswig-Holstein Administrative Court, arguing that the state government is failing to meet its obligations under EU nature conservation law.
DUH and EJF are calling for a mandatory environmental assessment to be carried out, in accordance with the EU Habitats Directive 92/43/EEC, as well as a total ban on bottom trawling in this national park. Each year, more than 36,000 hours of trawling are recorded in protected habitats within this park, mainly for brown shrimp fishing. According to the NGOs, this activity has devastating consequences (the disappearance of sand coral reefs, bycatch of marine species).
Similar proceedings are under way in France, Spain, Sweden and the Netherlands, where a district court recently required permits to be granted subject to the condition that no ecological damage be caused. (Original version in French by Lionel Changeur)