Brussels, 07/06/2001 (Agence Europe) - The European Commission and Senegal have agreed to extend until the end of the year (i.e. by five months) the current fisheries protocol that concerns Spanish, French, Italian, Portuguese and Greek fishing fleets. The parties concerned had already decided to extend by three months (from 1 May to 31 July) the provisions of this protocol that was to expire end April (see EUROPE of 30 April, p.15). This reprieve was to allow negotiators on both sides to have sufficient time in which to conclude a new agreement, "the duration of which should be less than four years", according to a representative of the Senegalese delegation. The battle is far from won, however, as there are still three essential elements of the agreement to be negotiated: reduction of fishing areas, the size of catches and financial compensation in favour of Senegal. Dakar has toughened its position on these different components of the new protocol, mainly on over-fishing which is beginning to threaten certain fish stocks.
The negotiating session, which was held in Senegal last week, did bring some success on certain technical aspects such as: compulsory offloading; increased trawler mesh size; embarkation of a team made up of 50% Senegalese (and no longer 33% as today); and biological rest periods (to be imposed twice yearly). Nonetheless, this progress could be brought into question because the Senegalese position has grown more inflexible, Community sources stress.
We recall that the agreement concluded with Senegal is of a mixed kind and the current protocol covers: 1) tuna fishing (12 pole and line vessels, 41 seiners and 23 longliners); 2) pelagic and trawler fishing (22 European vessels of which 6 operate within the 12-mile limit, with an total catch limit of 25,000 tonnes annually). The fishing activities of Community vessels concern mainly tuna, deep sea shrimps and benthic species such as hake, as well as species living in shallower waters, such as cephalopods and grouper. The financial compensation paid by the EU in application of the current protocol amounts to EUR 12 million annually, that is, a total of EUR 48 million (over the period 1997-2001). Certain flexibility is granted to European shipowners since the duration of permits for fishing may be 3 or 6 months.