Withdrawal Agreement and Beyond

If this is the case, the UK will then enter a transition period (aka implementation period) to the end of 2020, during which the UK will legally be outside the EU but remain closely aligned to it.

For the fishing industry, two important questions arise from this new set of circumstances:

1. How will the UK be treated during the transition period, when it no longer has a seat in the EU’s decision-making fora, including the Fisheries Council?

2. Will the terms of the longer-term future economic agreement between the UK and the EU, to be agreed during the coming year, ensure that the UK can act an independent coastal state, with the rights and responsibilities ascribed by the UN Law of the Sea to that legal status; or will the UK fishing industry again be sacrificed, as it was in the 1970s, for other national priorities?

There is no crystal ball to help us with these questions. And we do live in unpredictable times. From what we know and what we can surmise, however, the situation is as follows:

Transition

For the duration of the transition, the UK will remain subject to the whole body of EU law, including the Common Fisheries Policy. The UK will not have a seat at the table when any new EU laws or international agreements are made. This is particularly significant for fishing, where the annual cycle of total allowable catches and quotas can carry huge implications for the immediate future of the fleets.

An obligation on the EU to “consult” the UK during the TAC setting exercise is written into the withdrawal agreement, as is an obligation for the parties to act in good faith towards each other. An immediate priority, now that the withdrawal agreement has been signed (if and when ratified) is to obtain clarity on what consultation, in this context, actually means. The EU will continue to speak for the UK in international fisheries negotiations, but the UK will no longer formally be part of the process through which the Commission and the member states coordinate the EU position. As part of EU coordination, the UK was but one voice in shaping policy – but it was an important voice. Outside the room but consulted as a third party could mean a weaker, or a stronger position. All parties will have in mind what the implications of immediate decisions will carry for future arrangements.

An extremely difficult set of circumstances this autumn means that crucial decisions must be taken during the annual EU/Norway bilateral negotiations for a fisheries agreement in 2020, as well as the EU Fish Council in December. How these decisions are made and the content of these decisions, therefore carry the utmost consequences for the UK fleets in 2020. They involve:

⦁ Dealing with scientific advice for a 70% cut in the TAC for North Sea cod

⦁ Zero catch advice/ bycatch reduction plans for some key stocks such as Celtic Sea cod and Irish Sea whiting

⦁ The EU requirement to set quotas to achieve maximum sustainable yield within one year and the threat of legal challenge by one or more environmental NGO

⦁ The provisions of the EU landing obligation, and the potential for chokes in mixed fisheries

Finding a way through this political and legal quagmire would not be easy or straightforward even in normal times. The jurisdictional issues and compressed timeframe between now and the end of the year only intensify these pressures.

Long Term Economic Agreement

So far as fishing is concerned, the withdrawal agreement and associated political declaration, just signed, varies little from that signed when Teressa May was Prime Minister. The EU recognises that the UK will be an independent coastal state with regulatory autonomy, albeit subject to the provisions of UNCLOS. The need for special consultative arrangements in relation to the annual quota setting process is acknowledged. It foresees a future fisheries agreement to be made within the broader context of a wide-ranging long -term economic agreement.

The Commission and EU 27 member states have made no secret that it is their intention to make that free trade deal contingent on the status quo on access arrangements and quota shares. By contrast, the UK has laid out in the Fisheries White Paper, the UK’s intention to use its rights under UNCLOS to control access over who is permitted to fish within the UK exclusive economic zone, and to negotiate quota shares which more closely reflect the resources in UK waters. Currently 3000 EU vessels fish within the UK’s EEZ, taking around two thirds of the catch. EU fleets fish about six times as much in UK waters as UK vessels fish in EU waters. The UK seeks a more balanced and fairer arrangement, consistent with the status of an independent coastal state.

It is somewhat of an understatement, therefore, to say that there is a very wide gulf on fishing rights, between the UK and the EU. It is worth recalling that fishing rights and Gibraltar were the last two outstanding issues to be resolved when the original withdrawal agreement was signed. Fishing is extremely high up the UK’s political priorities. There is a cross-party consensus that fishing was very shabbily treated in the 1970s, and the UK’s departure from the EU, provides an historic opportunity to address some of the damage done. In many eyes, fishing is a litmus test for whether Brexit was worth it. It has a symbolism that goes well beyond the immediate issues of who fishes where and for how much. The UK fishing industry is united in its conviction that the UK must retain the scope to act as, as well as having the formal legal status of, an independent coastal state.

The stage is set therefore, for a major political conflict ahead over fishing rights, as a framework agreement is thrashed out. The UK will by default, have the status of an independent coastal state. The EU will seek to limit and fetter that status. Any UK government will want to avoid the odium associated with another sell-out, but the EU can be expected to play hardball, using trade to the extent that it can, to keep the UK aligned as closely as it can to the status quo. Why wouldn’t it, when the current asymmetrical and exploitative arrangements work so well to its advantage?

The UK has made plain that it regards fishing rights and an EU/UK trade agreement as entirely separate and has international precedence on its side. There are no examples of any country permitting free access to its natural resources as part of a trade deal.

It is unreasonable to expect good management decisions to emerge from weak or flawed stock assessments, and so the fishing industry has a strong vested interest in working in partnership with scientists to deliver accurate and relevant information on aspects that are not delivered through the more formal parts of the assessment process.

Various fisheries science partnerships have been underway for many years. The NFFO/CEFAS/DEFRA Fisheries Science Partnership, for instance, was first established in 1993. The significance of the present report, however, is the acknowledgement in the very senior parts of ICES, that industry information, carefully collected has a central, rather than marginal, part to play.

One of the challenges identified in the report is the need to ensure that industry data is collected in a format that allows it to be used in ICES stock assessments. There is nothing more frustrating than submitting data which is then rejected because of doubts over its provenance or quality. To address this, one of the next steps is to produce a protocol/guidance which can be used at the design stage of any new partnership project to ensure that the information can be used in the assessment process.

The report from the Workshop on Science with Industry Initiatives (WKSCINDI) is now available at the ICES Community website here.

The leaflet covers:

• Rules
• Fishing Opportunities
• Access Arrangements
• Licensing Arrangements
• Landing fish into EU
• Control and Enforcement
• Fisheries Funding
• More Information

The leaflet is available at gov.uk/brexit-fisheries

The event was managed by Seafish under the guidance of a steering group and was sponsored by the Fishmongers Company, Seafish, Defra and industry organisations including the NFFO. A number of retailers generously provided bursaries to encourage the participation of working fishermen. It is both a matter of pride and regret that the event was hugely oversubscribed. The event was designed to be a must attend event and succeeded in generating a huge amount of interest at the price of disappointing many who wanted to attend but for whom there was no space. All fishermen who applied were, however, accommodated.

Fourth generation, Canadian fishermen, Wes Eriksen, provided the conference keynote speech, which described how the basket-case groundfish fishery, off the Canadian west coast, was turned around into an exemplar of sustainability, accountability and profitability. Offered the option of leaving management of their fishery to government, the west coast fishermen elected to take on the responsibility themselves and the result is widely regarded to be a major success. The ingredients of that success: secure fishing rights, capacity in balance with fishing opportunities, full accountability of total catch, hard work and compromise did not come easily, and Wes was open in identifying the industry’s fears and shortcomings in making progress.

Although there are inevitable differences between our diverse inshore fisheries and those off the Canadian west coast, the main themes of Wes’s presentation have relevance to the UK’s inshore fisheries:

• Building trust, between fishermen, and between regulators and the regulated.
• Ways of providing full accountability for catches
• Finding ways to provide security of fishing rights and ending the race to fish, as the basis for sustainable fishing
• Taking responsibility and taking the lead on sustainable fishing initiatives
• Setting objectives and working steadily towards them

Timing

Holding the conference now was partly related to Brexit and the opportunities and challenges when operating outside the CFP. But the timing was also related to a shift in government attitude. The complexity of the inshore fisheries had, in the past, led it being put in the too difficult box by successive administrations. The growing recognition that many of the problems currently facing the inshore fisheries, particularly displacement from other fisheries, are unintended consequences of previous government policy has led to an appetite to move beyond myths and hearsay to solid evidence-based policy. Government’s present interest in close cooperation between fisheries managers and the fishing industry, through different forms of co-management, also means that the time is ripe for a more creative approach. The challenge is how to put co-management into practice in the very diverse inshore fisheries around the coast.

Report

There is a determination that the evident enthusiasm surrounding the conference will not be wasted. A report will be produced to capture the idea and insights generated during the conference, but a number of work-strands will now emerge to translate those ideas into reality. These will be discussed within the steering group but may include:

• The artificial divide at 10 metres is seen as redundant. What alternatives are available? Defining fisheries management solutions and management structures in new ways that make sense, particularly in relation to transboundary fisheries, is an important challenge
• Recognising that the inshore sector is far from immune from technological change. Increased efficiency has implications for overall fishing pressure and the number of participants who can be safely allowed in a fishery
• How to bring the co-management ideal into reality in the context of different fisheries is a major but necessary challenge
• Many people will hold opinions about how fisheries should be managed but the core relationship involves three groups: the fishermen in the fishery whose activities are being regulated, the fisheries regulators and the fisheries science, whose information is generally the basis for management decisions: how best to bring these groups together
• The management of activities which affect fishing mortality is the key to fisheries management. What management structures make sense when the fishery concerned has inshore and offshore components?
• Better exploitation patterns and post-landing activities are important factors which impact on the profitability of inshore fisheries
• Facing up to the reality that limiting access to involves difficult choices but is an essential foundation for sustainable fisheries management
• Situating the future management of inshore fisheries within an understanding of its context within
• Generating reliable data on catch and vessel activities, as the basis for sound management decisions
• Looking out for unintended (but not necessarily unforeseeable) consequences of management decisions, which can impact on inshore fishing
• How to generate high levels of compliance with rules that make sense and deliver sustainable fisheries?
• How to deal with the increasingly constricted space in which to fish
• How inshore fisheries could best be managed in the context of altered access arrangements and national quota shares, following the UK’s departure from the EU and therefore the CFP?
• What role could community quotas play in those inshore fisheries where quota species are the target?

These are a fraction of the issues raised during the course of the conference and it will be for the steering group to decide what to focus on first.

We welcome suggestions.

Introduction

We agree that Defra should consult widely on how additional quota that is secured as the UK leaves the EU, should be allocated. We do not, however, consider that the questionnaire format is an appropriate vehicle for the views of a national organisation which has a duty to reflect the views and interests of a wide spectrum of members and whose policy positions often reflect carefully balanced compromises, developed after extensive discussion.

We therefore submit this paper in response to Defra’s call for evidence.

We have elsewhere argued that FQAs should remain the basis for allocating existing quota and for recognition of FQA’s role in delivering sustainable fisheries. We continue to hold those views.

Additional Quota

It is worth noting that the availability of additional quota is unlikely to be evenly spread and will reflect:

⦁ The outcomes of UK/EU negotiations for a post-exit fisheries agreement

⦁ UK negotiating priorities and the timing of any adjustments

⦁ The scale of the divergence, stock by stock, between current relative stability shares and an objective assessment of the resources located in the UK EEZ

We understand “additional quota” available to the English fleet, to refer to increased UK share of TAC species, over -and-above that obtained under the current relative stability allocation keys, subsequently adjusted to reflect deductions proportionate to FQA holdings that are managed by the devolved administrations. The residual will be “additional English quota”.

Allocating Additional Quota

It is axiomatic that “everyone wants more quota.” Government therefore faces the unenviable task of rationing fishing opportunities. That is inherent in the task of limiting access to a fishery. Failure to limit access only has one destination: excess effort leading to reduced catches for all. This is the most basic reality of fisheries management.

Limiting access is necessary, therefore, but requires hard choices. There is a responsibility on Government to be as equitable as possible and transparent as possible in the allocation process, and there should also be clarity about the aims and objectives of the policies in which allocation decisions are embedded.

Quota, though vitally important in many fisheries, is not the only way in which, post-Brexit, benefits can be brought to the fishing industry and thought ought to be given to how to achieve equity through a broad package of measures to support fishing and our coastal communities. This might include:

⦁ Additional quota but also:

⦁ Reduced competition from non-UK vessels within the 12mile limit

⦁ Using additional quota to secure quota exchanges favourable to the UK as part of a balanced reciprocal agreement

⦁ Reduced regulatory burden through UK autonomy on fisheries regulation

⦁ New forms of co-management in which fisheries stakeholders hold a key position

⦁ Post-EMFF financial support

One way of navigating through the maze of competing demands for more quota would be to establish explicit principles against which the claims could be assessed. Such an approach would at least make explicit the value judgements behind the allocation decisions.

Possible Allocation Principles

⦁ Equity: In a broad sense, the benefits of leaving the EU and the Common Fisheries Policy should be made available to the whole of the UK fishing industry, irrespective of sector, vessel size or type, or target species; at the very least, post-Brexit, no industry group should be left worse off

⦁ Chokes: Additional quota could be used to facilitate the progressive implementation of the landing obligation, in particular, to mitigate chokes in mixed fisheries

⦁ Acute Quota Shortage: Additional quota could/should be used to address acute quota shortages where these are demonstrable, even in non-choke situations

⦁ New Entrants: Additional quota could be used to encourage new entrants but only where this does not imply an unsustainable increase in fishing capacity

⦁ Community Benefits: The allocation of additional quota could be made contingent on bringing long-term benefits to a specific region/coastal community or to bring wider economic benefits to the UK economy

⦁ Sustainability Incentives: Additional quota could be used to incentivise voluntary adoption of desirable fishing patterns and practices

⦁ Consistency with Management Objectives: The allocation of additional quota should be consistent with the long-term fisheries objectives and used to facilitate transitional arrangements as the fleets adjust to the post-Brexit management regime

⦁ Evidence: All allocation decisions should be based on evidence and transparent information

Fishing Plans

One approach might be to invite the Defra/MMO managed part of the fishing industry to submit fishing plans for additional quota, which could be assessed against the criteria above.

We do not support a monetary quota auction system as it would over time lead to an unhealthy concentration of ownership and control of quota.

Fishing Plans could provide the means through which a group, bidding for extra quota, could:

⦁ Demonstrate how additional quota could be used to underpin sustainable and profitable fishing activities

⦁ Be a vehicle for co-management

⦁ Contain policies on the encouragement of new entrants

⦁ Detail how fleet capacity of the group is aligned to fishing opportunities

⦁ Explain how additional quota will be used to mitigate choke risks

⦁ Detail how additional quota would support the relevant coastal community

⦁ Contain details of partnership working with fisheries scientists to improve the information base for management decisions

Capacity

A balance between fishing capacity and available fishing opportunities is the most basic and essential element in any successful form of fisheries management. It will be important that additional quota does not fuel an unsustainable fleet expansion in any part of the fleet. What may be right for an individual operator might not be right at aggregate level and so it will be important to have a robust understanding sector by sector of where that fleet component stands on the fishing effort/yield curve.

This is particularly true of the inshore fisheries which did not have access to large scale decommissioning grants in the past, where physical space for fishing is under pressure, and where there remains a significant latent capacity issue.

Effort Control

We do not favour effort control, as TACs and quota allocations will remain as fixtures because most of our regulated stocks will still be shared with other countries and there is no plausible alternatives to quantitative national limits on catches. In these circumstances, effort control would therefore only add a further layer of control and bureaucracy. Furthermore, the evidence worldwide suggests that input controls generate behaviours incompatible with management objectives and can carry adverse safety implications.

We do favour, however, an exploration of whether genuinely low impact vessels could be taken out of the quota system by counting their catches against a notional allocation managed at national level.

Low Impact Fishing Vessels

There is a strong argument for taking genuine low impact fishing vessels out of the quota management system altogether by accounting for the mortality attributable to their catches by a single allocation at the start of each year. Additional quota on a few key species could be used to facilitate this transition.

From one perspective this approach is to revert to the arrangements which applied to the under-10 metre fleet before it became distorted and engorged by displacement of effort from the over-10m fleet in the late 1990s, as operators fled the impact of cod recovery measures.

There is broad agreement that the artificial division of the fleet at 10 metres is increasingly irrelevant, as some parts of this fleet have developed into highly efficient vessels with catches that can exceed many over-10 metre vessels. The challenge for this fleet is to ensure that it is integrated into the mainstream management regime.

Taking genuine low impact vessels out of the day-to-day quota management regime will depend heavily on how “low impact” is to be defined. Relatively low catches of target species would be one way, so long as there is confidence that at aggregate level, catches are fully accounted for. Accurate recording of catches using mobile phone technology could be a precondition for inclusion in this relatively privileged group.

A simple length division at 7 metres has been suggested and may be the most tractable approach, although it risks replicating some or all the unintended consequences associated with the boundary at 10 metres.

A wider definition of “low impact” could be envisaged embracing an assessment of impact on:

⦁ Target species

⦁ Non-target commercial species

⦁ Cetaceans and other non-commercial species

⦁ Seabed ecosystems

⦁ Carbon footprint

Although more comprehensive as a definition, this approach would be considerably more complex to manage. Whatever definition is chosen, it will be important to recognise that inshore fishing is a highly varied but also highly dynamic sector in terms of evolving technologies, modes of operation, business organisation. Some parts of the fleet comply with the ideal of an artisanal small-scale fishery, whilst others are highly entrepreneurial in organisational terms with a considerably greater impact on stocks.

Additional Brexit-related quota should be seen as an opportunity to address some of the longstanding issues associated with quota shortage in specific coastal fisheries. But as the brief discussion above suggests, it will be important to understand the issues in the round – not just as a quick-fix quota bung to keep the noisiest voices quiet. The Inshore Management Conference planned for October 2019 will, hopefully, shed light on the options available.

Recreational Fishing

We are strongly of the view that there should be no question of allocating quota to recreational sector in advance of:

⦁ A comprehensive national licensing scheme within a fully implemented conservation and enforcement policy

⦁ Catch constraints at least equivalent to the commercial fishing sector

⦁ Full catch recording

Conclusion

The UK’s departure from the EU provides an opportunity to rebalance the UK’s quota shares to more closely reflect the resources located within the UK’s EEZ.

Allocating additional quota provides an opportunity but also a challenge. Limiting access to fisheries – including access to quota – is a fundamental part of managing fisheries sustainably.

In order to ensure that equitable and transparent criteria are used to allocate additional quota, we suggest that explicit principles linked to management objectives are established, against which bids, expressed as fishing plans, may be assessed. Those fishing plans which most closely matched the qualifying criteria would receive additional quota.

We oppose effort control but are open to using some additional quota to take genuine low-impact vessels out of the quota system – if this can be done safely. No quota allocations should be made to the recreational sector without a comprehensive conservation and enforcement regime in place first.

Full details here

Follow the link below to the Delta online portal to register your details. You will then be able to download all relevant documents and guidance for your application. Please note that ALL applications must be submitted via Delta and will not be accepted from any other source.

Please direct any queries about your application via the Delta portal, where questions will be collated and answers made available for the benefit of all applicants.

https://www.delta-esourcing.com/respond/YJ3GBZ9PEM

The competition will close on Thursday 12th September at 12:00 noon.

There will also be the opportunity to ask questions about the fund to help with your application at two webinars, scheduled for:

Tuesday 30th July 10:00 – 11:00

Wednesday 14th August 10:00 – 11:00

https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/seafood-innovation-fund-sbri-competition-tickets-65108040903

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Seafood Innovation Fund

Programme Support Team

Cefas, Pakefield Road, Lowestoft, Suffolk, NR33 0HT

seafoodinnovationfund@cefas.co.uk

After weeks of rumours, the publication of annual scientific advice by ICES, at the end of last week, confirmed that on the main indicators, the stock is going in the wrong direction and that a 33% cut in the total allowable catch in 2019 has been insufficient as a corrective. In the scientific jargon:

Fishing mortality (F) has increased since 2016, and is above Flim in 2018. Spawning-stock biomass (SSB) has decreased since 2015 and is now below Blim. Recruitment since 1998 remains poor.

To bring the biomass to maximum sustainable yield in one year, ICES recommends a further drastic 63% cut.

What went wrong?

As usual, there is a mix of environmental and fisheries effects at work. ICES points to low recruitment but also suggests that unidentified changes in fishing patterns are implicated. The suspicion must be that the destabilising effect of the EU landing obligation is one of the factors at work. North Sea cod was brought under the landing obligation in 2018. Climate change and some kind of environmental regime shift is identified as a possible factor behind poor recruitment.

Mixed Fisheries/Chokes

Cod in the North Sea is not a targeted species but is caught as a valuable bycatch along with other species in a mixed demersal fishery. This makes managing a reduction in fishing pressure on cod a difficult and challenging prospect, particularly in the context of the landing obligation and the potential for cod to choke other demersal fisheries. As vessels are no longer permitted to discard, chokes occur when the exhaustion of quota for one species precludes the vessel, group, or member state, from catching the quotas of its main economic species. The concern now is that cod quota will be out of alignment with the TACs for haddock, whiting, saithe, and plaice, increasing the risk of chokes dramatically in 2020. Because of its body size and shape, cod is not an easy species to separate out without losing other valuable species in the catch. So more selective fishing gear is hard to achieve for both technical and economic reasons.

What to do?

Because there is a strong element of déjà vu, to again finding ourselves in trouble with North Sea cod, it will be important to learn the lessons of the 1990s and early 2000s, when the biomass of cod was last in decline.

Those lessons were:

• The fundamental driver of the crisis was fleet overcapacity: it will be important to identify if this has re-emerged as a problem in parts of the fleet
• Drastic cuts in the TAC for cod within the context of a mixed fishery, only gave rise to large-scale discarding. In today’s context that means illicit discarding, or chokes. Both carry serious consequences
• Input controls in the form of days-at-sea restrictions do not work. There is no linear relationship between a reduction in permitted time at sea and fishing mortality on cod. Effort control has a tendency to generate perverse outcomes
• Displacement effects mean that knock-on effects in adjacent fisheries can be expected
• A step-wise approach rather than big bang measures often delivers better results in the longer term
• More intelligent ways of avoiding concentrations of cod are likely to have more effect than drastic TAC cuts and effort control

There will be intense efforts this autumn to design and agree effective measures, fleet by fleet, to minimise catches of cod and to reverse the observed decline.

Jurisdiction

North Sea cod is currently a jointly managed stock between EU and Norway. If the UK leaves the EU at the end of October under no-deal conditions, the UK will immediately become an independent coastal state and will enter the year -end negotiations for a fisheries agreement in 2020 as an independent party. If there is a withdrawal agreement between the UK and the EU, and the fisheries component remains as the current draft agreement, the UK will for 2020 remain subject to the CFP rules but will not take its seat during meetings when the EU coordinates its own positions. Instead, it will be “consulted” during the negotiations, although it is not clear what form those consultations will take. The UK under these circumstances would become an independent coastal state in January 2021.

Under all scenarios, the UK will be a major player on decisions on North Sea cod, both as the main quota holder of North Sea cod and the economic zone in which a substantial proportion of the cod population is located.

Displacement

The fishing industry is noticeably adaptive. Fishing vessels, as businesses, will seek to remain viable trip-by-trip, under whatever the regulatory regime may apply. In the past, drastic management measures have generated pressures leading to fleet displacements into adjacent areas, or into changing target species, or gear types. All such displacement effects have potential knock-on effects.

Conclusion

In navigating their way through to a solution, fisheries managers and the fishing industry will have to take account of:

• The adverse scientific advice
• The consequences of the EU landing obligation
• Cod as a bycatch in several fisheries
• Self-inflicted legal constraints, such as the EU MSY timetable and constraints on the use of fishing mortality ranges to set TACS
• The economic viability of fishing businesses and communities
• The volatile political and jurisdictional context

Above all, experience suggests that fisheries managers working with the fishing industry, will have to try to understand and anticipate the impact of proposed solutions in the real world.

UK ministers have indicated that when the UK leaves the EU and therefore the CFP, it will retain the principle of a landing obligation, although changes are envisaged to ensure that it is workable. In the meantime, all CFP rules, including the landing obligation apply to UK fishing vessels.

The headline points emerging from the seminar were that:

• Progress in implementing the EU landing obligation had been made but the scale of the changes involved meant that it will take time to resolve the outstanding issues
• In many fisheries, unwanted catch had been significantly reduced, prior to and since the landing obligation came into force; solutions have been very varied, depending on the characteristics of each fishery
• Monitoring and controlling the landing obligation remains inherently difficult
• To date, serious chokes in mixed fisheries have been avoided by careful but significant mitigation measures
• High Survival and de minimis exemptions have been essential in reducing choke risks
• Only 20% of fishermen surveyed thought that the landing obligation was a good way to minimise discards
• The requirement to land undersized fish is proving to be an obstacle to reducing unwanted catch; the logic of incurring extra cost to land dead fish, which would then go for fishmeal, was not understood by the fishing industry, especially when a proportion would otherwise survive, depending on the species/gear
• Discards permitted under available exemptions were not being adequately recorded, which will make it more difficult to justify exemptions in the future
• There is a serious concern that the landing obligation has meant that scientists have lost confidence that they have a realistic understanding of total catches (fishing mortality), the fundamental parameter in stock assessment and fisheries management
• The Commission clings to the idea that remote electronic monitoring could be a panacea that could solve the problem of how to police the landing obligation, albeit within a risk-based approach; others in the meeting took the view that REM had a role to play in some fisheries but only after the fundamental management problems were resolved, and only with the willing cooperation of all those involved
• Positive and negative incentives, created consciously or inadvertently, would be central to the success, of the implementation of the landing obligation

There seemed to be broad agreement in the meeting that the landing obligation was not an objective in itself but a way of assuaging public concerns about high levels of discards, which were, in many cases, a side-effect of the management system in place. The landing obligation did create a strong incentive to reduce unwanted catch, but it was acknowledged that there was some way to go before the landing obligation could be said to be fully integrated into, and consistent with, other parts of the CFP.

Commission

In summing up, the Commission took the view that:

• The process of implementing the landing obligation is on-going. A lot has been done and solutions developed, specifically:
• By-catch TACs have been introduced to ensure continuity of fisheries and to provide quotas for member states without them

1. By-catch reduction plans are being constructed to rebuild vulnerable stocks
2. Selectivity improvements have been made, but there are no easy solutions
3. Quota management changes are being made to facilitate the landing obligation and avoid chokes
4. There is no silver bullet

• Significant changes take time
• Many initiatives are on-going at different levels (gear, management, markets, policy etc), but integration of different tools will be need for a more structured approach and tailor-made responses
• Regional specificities – sea basin and fleet differences should be taken into account.
• The importance of exemptions was underlined
• It is preferable to avoid unwanted catches through selectivity or avoidance rather than dealing with them on land
• Need to raise awareness – (1) there is a need to convince fishermen of the objective (to take ownership of the landing obligation), (2) find a way to translate sustainability efforts into market value (market incentives)
• Other solutions are needed for landed fish below MCRS
• There should be more sharing among stakeholders and member states of best practices, success stories (can northern solutions be applied in the Mediterranean?) and also failures
• We need to evaluate how different measures have performed to adjust our policies accordingly – an adaptive approach

Summary

This was a serious attempt to understand what effect the landing obligation is having. Few would now argue that article 15 of the Basic CFP has been the best possible approach to EU discard policy. Nevertheless, progress has been made in the reduction of unwanted catch. Many issues remain, however. It will take time and effort to resolve these but sharing information on best practice could help and a collaborative approach will help.

NFFO

June 2019

Defra, the MMO, UKAFPO and the NFFO will meet regularly to assess progress, identify problem areas and work on potential solutions. This means that policy makers, regulators and the broad range of diverse fishing interests (under and over-10m inshore and offshore) are in the room. This is not a policy making group, but it does provide a space where issues can be discussed frankly and give expression to a genuinely collaborative approach. These discussions run parallel to separate conversations being held with processors and retailers, as well as discussions between Defra/MMO and UKAFPO on the more operational aspects of quota management.

The Forum will be chaired by the NFFO and Defra will provide a secretariat to ensure that all action points are followed through.

Identifying potential choke risks and formulating possible solutions will be on the agenda for each meeting, as will regular updates from Defra on developments on the policy side that could have an impact on the industry.

There is a recognition that the industry has done much already to reduce unwanted catch, but improved selectivity and avoidance are inherently difficult in some fisheries, where losses of marketable catch as well as technical issues can be an obstacle. High survival and de minimis exemptions have been central to avoiding serious chokes in 2019, so far. The Group will assess how these are operating.

The group will also discuss the overall performance of the landing obligation and identify where improvements could be made. When the new legislation was adopted in 2013, interspecies flexibility was considered to be a major tool for the avoidance of chokes but has proven to be all but inoperable in practice. The group will discuss this and alternative mechanisms that could help with the integration of the landing obligation into the broader fisheries management system.

The five stocks subject to zero catch advice, and the innovative way of dealing with this through bycatch TACs and bycatch reduction plans, will be a particular focus of attention, simply because they are new and untested.

Big changes such as the landing obligation tend to generate unintended consequences by creating new economic incentives. The Group will keep track of these to ensure that they do not take the industry as a whole in unwelcome directions.

There is wide acknowledgement amongst regulators and the wider industry, that the landing obligation marks a huge change and challenge. Those challenges are best tackled in a cooperative collaborative way and the forum is a vehicle for that cooperation.

A major conference planned for October, will provide a once-in-a-generation opportunity for all parts of the fishing industry to bring clarity to the issues and have a say on what that future should look like. Fisheries management bodies and the main national fishing organisations are backing the conference, but the principal aim is to give working fishermen a voice in what kind of future they want for their fisheries.

This will not be a conference that only generates hot air and a report which gathers dust. Too much is being invested in it for that to happen. Change in our industry is constant and inevitable, but not always in the right direction. Massive preparations are under way to ensure that this event is the point at which the industry takes its own future in its hands. The idea is a simple one: get all those with a stake in the future of inshore fishing into the room, hear what they have to say, and harvest the best ideas to inform future management and policy in this area. Hard choices as well as opportunities are ahead, and it is better if these are made on the basis of sound knowledge.

If you are involved in inshore, fishing it is vital that you make the effort to attend.

Preparations

A workshop, held recently in London to shape the form and content of the conference, provided a flavour of what the main event will cover. Representatives from inshore fisheries from all parts of the coast, along with Defra, MMO and the devolved administrations, gathered to plan the event.

Even how “inshore fishing“ is defined, carries policy implications. Alternatives discussed such as small-scale, or artisanal, or day-boats, all carry strengths and weaknesses. Some definitions work better in some areas and circumstances than others.

Issues discussed at the workshop included:

⦁ What are inshore fisheries? Should they be defined by area, size of boats, catching power?

⦁ What are the stocks that are currently exploited by inshore fisheries? Are they all inshore or do some of them straddle the inshore and offshore? How best to manage each stock, or mixes of stocks?

⦁ Are there stocks that could be exploited by inshore fisheries? What are the barriers obstructing this?

⦁ The importance of non-quota species to the inshore fisheries; how best to manage these valuable resources?

⦁ Where are technological developments taking us? What is the right response?

⦁ How do we balance fleet capacity and technological development with fishing opportunities?

⦁ How can we make co-management work in the context of fleet diversity?

⦁ How do we balance maximum flexibility to target species when they are available, with the constraints necessary to prevent over-exploitation of stocks?

⦁ Who should have access to fish inshore fisheries? Restricting access is the foundation for sustainable management but inevitably involves hard choices.

⦁ Is it possible to lift genuine low-impact vessels right out of the quota system?

⦁ How do we encourage new blood into the industry without destabilising what is already there? What are the implications of increased effort?

⦁ How do we factor in and manage the huge regional differences and fleet diversities evident in the inshore fleets?

⦁ The devolution settlement is a political reality. How do we work around it?

All this boils down to one question: what framework will allow the fishing industry to take more responsibility for managing its own fisheries, sector by sector, area by area? Government knows from bitter past experience of unintended consequences that, ‘if we do it alone, we will get it wrong”.

NFFO

Many fishers in the room were members of the NFFO, from all parts of the coast. The South West, South East and South Coast were particularly well represented at the workshop, as you would expect, given the importance of inshore fishing in these areas. But there was a strong showing too from Northern Ireland, the North East and the North West. All could contribute with their experience and knowledge.

The Federation’s contribution set out a few reference points to be kept in mind for the October conference and its afterlife:

1. Policy should be evidence-based

2. Policy should seek to establish appropriate forms of co-management

3. There should be full recognition of regional and fleet diversity

4. There should be clear and agreed objectives

5. There should be coherence with other parts of the fisheries management system – avoiding displacement effects

6. Life beyond the conference: momentum should be built into the arrangements

7. Humility: inshore fisheries management is inherently difficult and complex: need to understand all facets

8. There should be awareness of the economic incentives created by different management options

Conference

Although this conference is jointly owned by the fishing industry and government, Seafish are acting as facilitators and have gone about the task with energy and skill, guided by a steering committee which reflects a cross-section of the industry.

What is said at the conference in October will shape our future. The aim is to draw lessons directly from what is said over the two days, along with the preparatory work being done, and that will directly feed into what follows. A lot hangs on this conference. If you work in the inshore you need to be there.

The conference will be held on Tuesday and Wednesday 8th and 9th October 2019.

The location will be: Leonardo Royal Hotel London Tower Bridge, 45 Prescot St, London, E1 8GP. For booking either link to Seafish website: https://www.seafish.org/article/future-of-our-inshore-fisheries-conference

Or Eventbrite at https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/future-of-our-inshore-fisheries-conference-tickets-62249105751

Download the paper

The designations are expected to largely complete the Blue Belt in English waters, the culmination of a decade long process, which although at first started off in a rush, has become more measured in marshalling the evidence base needed to justify site selection.

Outstanding Concerns

That does not mean there are not sites that cause concern to the fishing industry. In the South West and Irish Sea in particular, some of the designations (such as South West Approaches to Bristol Channel MCZ and South Rigg MCZ) have been in areas where there exists intense fishing activity. We think that better options exist that could limit the impact on fisheries and the environmental risks of displacing activities from prime fishing grounds to less fished and more pristine areas.

Queenie Corner MCZ in the Irish Sea reflects a preference of the fishing industry to identify an area to protect mud habitat that limits undermining sustainable Irish Sea Nephrops fisheries. With the more problematic South Rigg MCZ site designated it will be important that the management process recognizes the important implications if it proposes significant displacement of activities that may increase pressures elsewhere, have implications on stock sustainability and ultimately on the fishing industry that is heavily dependent on the stock in the Irish Sea.

Progress

While the new designations take the total coverage of Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) in UK waters to over 30%, parts of the green lobby remain frustrated by the pace in the introduction of management. A scientific paper published in the journal Science at the end of 2018, and reported in the Guardian, claimed in a misleading way that trawling in MPAs was more intense than in the rest of European waters – it neglected to count fisheries management measures that already limit fisheries – for instance, a ban on trawling below 800m depth which covers 4.9 million km2 of European Seas, heavily skewing the analysis and resulting in a highly misleading conclusion. Management has in fact been progressing in the UK, especially inshore where 72 sites in English waters now have restrictions on bottom towed fishing activities.

Campaigners should, nonetheless, recognize that channeling public policy onto MPAs translates into a highly bureaucratic form of marine management that requires appropriate evidencing and inevitably takes time. It also has opportunity costs in directing resources from other things; focused attention on some areas of fisheries management has been one of the casualties.

Collaborative Conservation

Beyond the hyperbole on the status of MPAs, we remain no less convinced than we were before the start of Marine Conservation Zone planning process that the key to sustainable marine conservation is by working collaboratively with the industry directly to find practical solutions to conservation problems, using science and innovation to provide a pathway for the industry to reduce and minimize its impacts. Helping to show what can and will work, in turn will frame more successful fisheries and conservation policy.

Some NGOs recognize the merits of such collaboration in addressing what are often knotty conservation issues. Important initiatives have been progressing on undesirable bycatch such as on elasmobranchs and others are getting underway on cetaceans and on seabirds.

It seems entirely possible that much more could be achieved by focusing the resources of science and innovation, working at a practical level to reduce fishing gear contact with the seabed. Such a locus would provide a win-win approach to marine conservation which will ultimately support marine livelihoods, the coastal communities that they support and sustainable fisheries that due to the renewable nature of the resource and low inputs (relative to other forms of food production), remain inherently a source of protein with a low environmental footprint.

The reconvened House of Lords enquiry into the implementation of the landing obligation has focused attention on a number of interrelated questions:

• Is the new legislation being complied with?
• Is it reasonable to expect large tonnages of fish, previously discarded, to be landed?
• Has sufficient weight been given to changes in selectivity and fishing behaviours, prior to and since the full implementation of the landing obligation?
• What has the effect of the various mitigation measures been?
• Has the problem of chokes* been dealt with?

A little-known NGO called Our Fish, has asserted that an analysis of catch composition of landings into Peterhead implies that large-scale discarding of cod could be read into the landing statistics. Even though this claim was based on a misreading of the catch compositions, the story was picked up by the Independent and echoed round the media for a while.

Many eyes are on our industry.

Retailers and the larger processors, in particular, are concerned about the reputational risk associated with buying fish from fisheries in which they cannot be sure that there is not continued discarding of quota species.

Compliance: Risk factors

We have known, from the outset, that monitoring the landings obligation across many thousands of vessels, operating at sea, would present a monumental challenge. Whilst some management authorities have said that the discard ban is, in effect, unenforceable, industry bodies, including the NFFO have pointed to Norway, where industry support for their form of a discard ban, well integrated into their management system, has been a major factor in its success.

The actual risk of illegal discarding of quota species is likely to vary by gear type, area of operation, mix of species encountered, access to quota and degree of choke risk, as well as skippers’ mind-set. In turn, choke risks will reflect the degree to which fishing opportunities have been set taking into account mixed fishery factors.

The scale of the challenge involved in monitoring and enforcing the landing obligation on many thousands of vessels operating across many different fisheries, has led some to consider that remote electronic monitoring (REM) provides a panacea. It does not.

Remote monitoring will have a role to play in some fisheries but as a recent conference organised by the Danish Government illustrated very well, the use of CCTV cameras, and other forms of remote surveillance, only really work when cameras, or the like, are invited on board vessels in order to better to demonstrate compliance. In other words, the use of cameras as a top-down big-brother panacea is unlikely to provide a solution for a series of practical, legal and ethical reasons. But in the right context, and within a collaborative system of co-management, REM can play a role and undoubtedly has a future. A considered and proportionate approach is required.

Industry Response

What has been the fishing industry’s response to the introduction of the new rules?

Although it is true that some of the more arcane aspects of the exemptions are not fully or widely understood, the signs are that there is broad awareness across the industry of the significance of the landing obligation. As a result, skippers feel under considerable pressure, and have felt for some years, to reduce unwanted catch. This has intensified changes in gear selectivity and fishing behaviours including:

• Increased mesh size in use
• Changes in gear geometry to increase selectivity
• Changes in fishing behaviours
• Movement away from areas in which there is increased risk of unwanted catch
• Increased efforts to source relevant quota

In parallel, there has been encouragement by industry organisations for vessels to carry Cefas observers to demonstrate compliance. Some vessel operators, including the majority of the English North Sea whitefish fleet, have agreed to continue a trial system in which carry CCTV cameras to document catches.

It is important to remember that the overall purpose of the landing obligation is not to replace discarding large amounts of fish at sea, with landing equally large quantities of fish into the ports for low-value fishmeal. The purpose is to create an incentive to encourage vessels to find ways of reducing unwanted catch.

Landing fish previously discarded at sea, to see them reduced to low-value fishmeal, with associated financial and environmental costs, would be irrational at multiple levels. If done at scale, it would create a different kind of public scandal.

Small amounts of previously discarded fish can find its way into the market for bait in the various pot fisheries.

Continuity and Progress

Improved selectivity and avoidance didn’t begin with the landing obligation and will not end with its implementation. Improvement in selectivity is and has been an ongoing process.

Excluding fish below minimum size has been achieved in many fisheries. Selection by species presents more of a challenge. In mixed fisheries selectivity tends to be limited by the different body size/shape of the different species, although progress can be made by focussing on different species behaviours. The latest experiments and trials focus on the use of light and knowledge of different fish behaviours to achieve desired species separation.

In the North Sea ground-fish fisheries, ICES data shows that discards were reduced by 90% in the 20 years before the landing obligation came along.

A significant part of this reduction was due to changes in the selectivity profile of fishing gears and changes in fishing practices to eliminate fish below minimum landing size. The introduction of square mesh panels and, often voluntary, increased mesh size in particular played a role.

Likewise, in the ultra-mixed demersal fishery in the Celtic Sea, increased mesh size, avoiding fishing in haddock-rich areas at night has had a major effect on discard rates.

Highly selective gear adjusted to local conditions have, similarly, been developed in the Irish Sea and the North Sea nephrops fisheries. The gear selectivity project in Northern Ireland – where whiting bycatch is a particular challenge – is one of many initiatives across the UK, and indeed Europe. In the Northern Irish example, £750,000 has been spent on gear trials and scientific analysis to help fleets adapt to the landing obligation. Solutions have been found that work for some parts of the fleet and work is ongoing on others

Nearly every fishery has a similar positive story to tell.

Mitigation Measures

Although some of the choke mitigation measures permitted under Article 15 of the CFP Regulation, for example inter-species flexibility, have been more or less inoperable, other, more useful approaches have been developed. These have been critical in avoiding chokes in the first half of 2019. Mitigation measures adopted include:

• De minimis exemptions – used where scope for selectivity improvements is limited, or costs are disproportionate. The exemptions, which permit a limited amount (max 7%) of continued discarding of the species concerned, vary in scale, location and gear-type
• High Survival Exemptions – apply to stocks where the evidence suggests high levels of survival after return to the sea. Some high survival exemptions are time-limited and conditional. The exemptions for plaice and skates and rays are particularly significant
• TAC Setting: choke risks can be reduced by an intelligent approach to setting TACs in mixed fisheries. The EU, working with ICES, has developed the concept of fishing mortality ranges, which allow fisheries managers a degree of flexibility in balancing competing priorities, including choke avoidance
• TAC removal – where the TAC served no purpose and posed a major choke risk (Dab and Flounder)
• Seabass, a species under a different form of catch limit, have been excluded from the landing obligation, avoiding the spectacle of tonnes of high value bass going for fishmeal
• TAC uplifts to cover preciously discarded fish – time will tell whether these have been calculated correctly, given the patchy data on which they are based
• A new innovation of bycatch quotas, adopted at the December Council, in which some quota is pooled to allow access for member states who have zero quotas of some species
• New ways of dealing with zero catch advice in mixed fisheries, which involve TAC increases along with bycatch reduction initiatives

Exemptions are agreed each year as part of joint recommendations prepared by member states working together regionally and submitted to the Commission for approval. The Joint Recommendations being prepared by member states for the discard plans in 2020, amount to over 50 pages of scientific justification for the proposed de minimis and high survival exemptions. The scientific recommendations pass through a system of quality control by the Scientific Technical and Economic Committee (STECF).

Other useful flexibilities, not yet available are under development. One of the most promising of these could help to minimise chokes, by authorising landings of amounts of unavoidable bycatch, when a quota is exhausted and a choke situation arises. In these circumstances, the fish would be sold on the human consumption market instead of going for fishmeal but vessels would not receive the full value of the catch, removing any incentive to target these species. This approach is so far precluded by the CFP. There is provision however, for this approach in the Fisheries Bill now passing through Parliament and would be available to UK vessels after the UK industry is free of the Common Fisheries Policy and any transition period.

In summary, mitigation measures have been adopted and have been absolutely essential to ease the introduction of the new policy. And to the avoidance of chokes – so far.

Quota Swaps

The jury is still out on whether the established system of quota swaps and transfers, along with limited top-slicing and redistribution, will be sufficient to avoid category 2 chokes (where there is sufficient in the system but it’s in the wrong place to prevent a choke developing). Historically, the market has proved more adept at moving unutilised quota to where it is needed, whilst avoiding unintended consequences, by comparison with administrative decisions made at the centre of government.

The obvious answer to easing this type of choke risks in many of our fisheries lies in fairer UK allocations as the UK renegotiates its national shares, when it becomes an independent coastal state. Pending that rebalancing and readjustment, mechanisms will be necessary to move quota to where it is needed.

Rocketing lease and purchase prices for potential choke risk quotas in the first half of this year, are strongly indicative of the industry’s efforts to locate quota to cover the totality their catches and to avoid chokes.

Marine Stewardship Council

Many parts of the fishing industry are heavily engaged with the Marine Stewardship Council process across a range of species. Satisfying the overarching principles of MSC (particularly Principle 1 – Species, and Principle 3 – Management Systems) will facilitate deeper congruity between the objectives of the landing obligation and MSC certification.

Momentum

Approaching the end of the first 6 months of the full implementation of the landing obligation, it’s possible to make some preliminary observations:

• The landing obligation is the biggest change to the management system since quotas were introduced in 1983
• The EU opted for a big-bang approach rather than the Norwegian species -by-species incremental approach
• The design of the legislation introducing the landing obligation was sub-optimal, reflecting a dysfunctional decision-making process for the management of in European fisheries
• The signs are that the fishing industry is responding to the new incentive to reduce unwanted catch; this is easier in some fisheries than others
• It makes no financial or environmental sense to land large amounts of unwanted catch which go for fishmeal. The focus of the landing obligation is and should remain the reduction of unwanted catch through avoidance and selectivity
• Mitigation measures have been absolutely critical in keeping the problem of chokes at bay; the second half of this year is likely to clarify whether enough has been done in this respect
• Access to quota is of extreme relevance in avoiding chokes; the mechanisms, international and national, for moving unutilised quota are being kept under review

Responsibilities and Cooperation

Those who are being regulated, and those with responsibility for fisheries regulation, have a duty to continue to work together to overcome the not insubstantial implementation problems ahead. Such an enormous change takes time to adapt and to work through the issues as they arise. All those involved, including those throughout the supply chain, have a duty of care to those at the sharp end, as well as a responsibility to maintain momentum towards a workable landing obligation. In turn, the catching sector has a responsibility to demonstrate that it is adapting to the new regime.

Whatever the shortcomings of the EU landings obligation and the way it came about, there is genuine public concern about the waste involved in large scale discards and the catching sector has to demonstrate that it is doing its part. Even though it is early days and there remain many problems to resolve, the signs are that the fishing industry is facing up to that responsibility.

Pockets

Ours is a complex, diverse, industry. There may be pockets of vessel operators who think that, even having accepted the quota uplifts associated with the landing obligation, they can carry on as they did in the past, by discarding unwanted catch. If such a minority exists, they are delusional and dangerous. Dangerous because carrying on as usual can only have one outcome – stock assessments that indicate increased fishing mortality, followed, as night follows day, by reductions in TACs. Delusional because, although few in number, they are in denial. This is a boomerang that will return very quickly. It will equally affect everyone: those who carry on business as usual, as well as those who make every attempt to reduce their unwanted catch.

Conclusions and Future

Given the scale of the changes involved, and taking into account flaws in the legislation, after six months, it is possible to say that the central purpose of the landing obligation – to incentivise reduction of unwanted catch of quota species is having an effect. Fishing vessels across the fleets are continuing to adapt their gears and fishing behaviours. The mitigation measures were still being shaped at the 11th hour, but they have been absolutely critical in dealing with some of the undesirable side effects of the landing obligation – most notably chokes in mixed fisheries. The second half of 2019 will inform us if enough has been done.

The key to dealing with the residual problem areas and maintaining momentum towards a workable and effective landing obligation, lies in a collaborative approach in which fisheries managers, the fishing industry and the whole supply chain, continue to work together to understand and deal with the issues as they arise.

A working group has been established to build a picture of how the industry is adapting to the landing obligation. The industry led group with Defra and MMO support, will:

• Discuss and develop landing obligation initiatives such as Bycatch Reduction Plans (BCRPs), Fully Documented Fisheries (FDF) schemes and available CFP flexibilities;
• Monitor the use of existing flexibilities and exemptions;
• Discuss and develop future policy initiatives to continue reducing unwanted bycatch post-Brexit;
• Assess upcoming choke risks and mitigation measures;
• Identify and plan regional focus groups to work on the detail of the above points.

In parallel, an ongoing dialogue, between retailers, processors/buyers, the catching sector and Defra aims to keep everyone in the supply chain involved in identifying issues and working on solutions.

It is well understood that if we were doing all this again, we wouldn’t start with article 15 of EU Regulation 1380/13. We would take a different approach that would avoid some of the more obvious pitfalls. Given where we are, however, the most constructive approach is to work collaboratively and systematically.

In Europe, the advisory councils have begun to review how the legislation could be improved, conscious that the Commission will soon begin work on the next CFP reform. In the UK, the discussion also embraces what changes could be available when the UK has regulatory autonomy to design its own solutions.

In the meantime, we will deal with the issues as they arise in a pragmatic, proportionate and constructive way, conscious that discard policy is important but must fit into an overall management system which promotes sustainable fishing and supports fishing businesses and communities.

It is important that the landing obligation is aligned with the other elements of fisheries policy in a coherent and integrated whole. TAC setting rules, technical measures, financial support mechanisms, and control rules should all fit together (or at least not conflict). The Common Fisheries Policy is not yet at that stage. Without a coherent approach, life is made very difficult on the deck and in the wheelhouse.

Dealing collaboratively with the adversities generated by a flawed piece of legislation may yet, however, prove to be the vehicle for new forms of co-management.

*A choke occurs in a mixed fishery, when exhaustion of one quota would mean a vessel or fleet would have to tie up for the rest of the year, losing the economic benefit of its main fishing opportunities.

Fact-checking George Monbiot’s ‘Stop eating fish’ opinion in The Guardian

Last week George Monbiot published an op-ed in The Guardian titled: Stop
eating fish. It’s the only way to save the life in our seas. It
has been shared over 20,000 times across social media spreading
misinformation and fearmongering far and wide. Our contribution to clean
it all up was a fact-checking of many of Monbiot’s ridiculous
statements. It sometimes feels petty to publish these things, but
Max does a nice job explaining the importance of fact-checking in the
first few paragraphs of his piece.

A refreshing opposite
to the lack of science in The Guardian is the New York Times. They
recently published a large online (and print)
infographic and article about the climate impacts of different kinds of
food. They used figures from one of my recent papers and cited some of
our reference pages on SustainableFisheries-UW.org. The article does
an excellent job linking climate change to food choices. Kudos to them.

If you see any fisheries misinformation in mainstream media that warrants
a response, or examples of good, evidence-based fisheries reporting worth
highlighting, send them to us. You can get in touch by messaging us
on Twitteror Facebook or through
the website directly.

Lastly, some of you who have gotten previous newsletters forwarded to you
have reached out asking how to sign up for this email list. The link to
sign up for this email list is here.

The AGM is open to all NFFO members and will be held in Fishmongers Hall, at London Bridge on Wednesday 22nd May 2019 beginning at 10.00am.

Members who wish to attend should register by emailing Joanna@nffo.org.uk or by calling 01904 635430 as Fishmongers require all attendees’ names on a list before the event.

Issues surrounding Brexit and the UK’s future as an independent coastal state, are likely to loom large in the discussions as will the landing obligation, policy towards small scale fleets, the Fisheries Bill etc. But the event is designed to allow grass roots members an opportunity to speak directly to the man who is in charge.

Despite seeing action against Scharnhorst north of Norway and off Normandy on D-Day, absolutely no symbolism should be read into our choice of HMS Belfast for the meeting of our Executive Committee, the day before the AGM. The vessel’s wardroom provides a convenient venue close to Fishmongers Hall, for the AGM the following day

The AGM is open to all NFFO members and will be held in Fishmongers Hall, at London Bridge on Wednesday 22nd May 2019 beginning at 10.00am.

Members who wish to attend should register by emailing Joanna@nffo.org.uk or by calling 01904 635430 as Fishmongers require all attendees’ names on a list before the event.

Issues surrounding Brexit and the UK’s future as an independent coastal state, are likely to loom large in the discussions as will the landing obligation, policy towards small scale fleets, the Fisheries Bill etc. But the event is designed to allow grass roots members an opportunity to speak directly to the man who is in charge.

Despite seeing action against Scharnhorst north of Norway and off Normandy on D-Day, absolutely no symbolism should be read into our choice of HMS Belfast for the meeting of our Executive Committee, the day before the AGM. The vessel’s wardroom provides a convenient venue close to Fishmongers Hall, for the AGM the following day

Consultation on the Introduction of Catch Recording for licenced fishing vessels in boats under 10 metres in length.

Response by the National Federation of Fishermen’s Organisations

New Requirements

Defra, Welsh Government and the Marine Management Organisation are consulting on a new requirement for mandatory catch reporting for the under-10 metre commercial sea fishing fleet in England and Wales.

If enacted, the new requirement would oblige all under-10m vessels to provide catch information on species subject to quotas, catch limits or effort restrictions, via a mobile device (a smart phone or tablet), prior to the fish leaving the vessel. Vessels which only catch non-quota species would be required to record their catches via a smart phone or lap-top within 24 hours.

In addition, for all catches, (quota and non-quota), a declaration would be required within 48 hours providing accurate weights of all species landed.

Purpose and Intention

We agree that the under-10m sector continues to be disadvantaged by patchy and incomplete collection of catch data. Stocks such as skates and rays, which are important for many small-scale vessels, when categorised as data-limited or data-poor, have been subject to a fundamentalist interpretation of the precautionary approach, triggering 20% annual reductions in TACs over successive years. The consequence has been a severe reduction in fishing opportunities and loss of earnings for the fleets concerned. The EU landings obligation has increased the risks associated with data gaps exponentially. The skates and ray fishery illustrates the type of circumstances where improved catch data could be used to channel policy and management decisions into a more constructive direction for the small scale fleets.

Accurate catch data is likely to become more important in the future. In addition to choke risks, the design of light touch management measures for genuine low impact vessels is likely to require better catch data from the small-scale fleets than has been the case to date. Understanding the individual vessel and aggregate fleet exploitation rates are central to the design and application of management measures appropriate to the stocks and fleets concerned.

We also agree that modern technology (smart phones, tablets and lap-tops) can play an important role in collecting and transmitting data in ways that are more efficient than paper log-books. There are advantages associated with technology that can minimise reporting requirements by eliminating duplication. Systems can be updated quite simply through software updates.

Caveats and Concerns

Having made these points, we consider that the consultation reflects a regulatory approach that:

• Is insufficiently grounded in an understanding of the practicalities involved, or the specificities of the fisheries concerned
• Has made little attempt to establish a meaningful dialogue about the practical implementations issues with those who will be affected
• Pays insufficient attention to the range of fishing operations, type of vessel, and patterns of landing in the under-10m sector
• Suggests a blanket bulldozer approach, when a more discriminating application would deliver better results
• Potentially threatens to criminalise small-vessel operators for non-compliance, when the ability to comply is outwith their hands.
• Potentially risks not catering for those who are not literate in the use of computers or electronic smart-phone technology

A good idea can be spoiled by poor implementation and this consultation carries the hallmarks of a recipe for, if not wholesale failure, then sub-optimal outcomes.

Our advice is to avoid the arbitrary timetable proposed and move away from a blanket approach. Instead, begin a national conversation with the different small scale fisheries in the ports and creeks about the pros and cons of improved data and the means available to secure it. This will certainly involve effort and delay but our considered view is that in the long run it will deliver better outcomes.

The list below provides a sample of the concerns raised by our members in response to the consultation. At the very least, they give a flavour of the gulf between the consultative proposals and the real world concerns which have arisen in response from very diverse fisheries.

Members’ Specific Concerns

• A requirement to submit a catch report before the boat land is impractical and in some circumstances is unsafe from a navigation and safety at sea perspective. Submission within 24 hours would make more sense
• There are practicality issues associated with the use of mobile phones in an open boat. There should be some recognition of this.
• In some instances, individual fishermen will be landing a significant number of different species – e.g. up to 30. The amount of time that the fishermen will then be required to spend entering data on a mobile app before disembarking and landing fish could be considerably above the estimates provided by Defra.
• In addition, the risk of mistakes was underlined given the requirement to complete declarations before disembarking when fishermen were often tired after long hours at sea.
• As presented, there is no mention in the Consultation document of recording discards for non-quota species (and MCRS may vary around the country) – how are such requirements to be enforced?
• There is also the question of presentation and how weights are to be recorded – e.g., for gutted fish the conversion factors to be used (not all fishermen in small vessels will automatically have the conversion factors in their heads).
• Reservations were expressed about Data Protection and what information was to be transmitted, and to whom, post-Brexit.
• Questions were also raised as to how the iPads, etc. would feed into the International Catch Certificate requirements and the EU fish transport documents.
• Considerable scepticism was expressed about the amount of duplication, or worse, involved in the weighing process – weights on landing, weights on arrival at auction where sorted and graded and then weights again on sale (bureaucracy gone crazy?).
• At a practical level, concern was also expressed about possible losses of connection and how they were to be dealt with, as well as the usual reservations about service when there are communications problems or technical glitches.
• Is it intended to, at least for an interim period, continue with a back-up paper system – and if so, does it also have to be expanded to cover the additional fisheries?
• Particular concern was expressed by the shellfish sector where there are already considerable reporting requirements in place: MSAR monthly returns for crab and lobster; IFCA returns for cockles and mussels; whelk returns; Shellfish Registration Documents for cockles, mussels and whelks. The question arises as to how all these returns (and other similar returns) are to be integrated into the new system. At the present time, considerable additional data is recorded (e.g. cock and hen crabs) in much finer detail – is this to be lost? Or are further burdens to be placed upon fishermen?

The outlook for the UK fishing industry as the UK stands poised to leave the Common Fisheries Policy was presented by Barrie Deas and Bertie Armstrong of the NFFO and SFF respectively.

Representatives from all the major fishing regions and sectors and beyond attended and took the opportunity to brief local MPs and members of the House of Lords.

Fisheries Minister, Robert Goodwill, thanked his predecessor, George Eustice, who was also present, and made the following points.

As MP for Whitby and Scarborough and a former shipping minister, I know the importance of the fishing industry to coastal communities and the huge diversity in our fishing fleets across the country. The processing sector is also vital

I also have processing plants, such as Whitby Seafoods in my constituency.

Importance of the fishing industry

The marine fishing, aquaculture and processing sectors together contribute £1.57 bn to the UK economy and employ around 33,000 people. but it is not just those people employed in the industry who are dependent on it. In coastal regions throughout the UK, fishing is part of the fabric of the community, it is central to the culture and atmosphere of coastal towns. But over the last 40 years some of these towns have seen a decline.

Our exit from the EU will give us an opportunity to rebalance that – and benefit our fishing industry and coastal communities.

There is a huge diversity in our fishing fleets across the country. This reflects the diversity and richness of our fishing grounds.

There will be challenges and these will be different for each of the sectors, but our fishermen are absolutely right to look forward to life after the Common Fisheries Policy and the sea of opportunity that lies ahead.

Leaving the EU will mean taking control of our waters for the first time in 40 years, and giving the UK the chance to decide who can access our waters and on what terms. Let me be clear, automatic rights for foreign vessels to access our waters will end.

Leaving the EU gives us a golden opportunity to secure a fairer share of fish for our fishermen and set out a sustainable future for our fisheries.

There will be other opportunities too – to look at how we share out the additional quota we negotiate, to make fisheries management more responsive and flexible, to develop new, lucrative markets and to focus on marketing local and premium products. Also an opportunity to build on our relation Norway, Faroes & Iceland as other independent coastal states

Business readiness and trade

Getting a fairer share of the fish in our waters is just part of the story. Being able to sell that fish for a good price and get it to market quickly is critical.

A priority therefore is going to be ensuring that trade can continue as smoothly as possible and with minimal disruption – especially if we leave the EU without a deal later this month. The live shellfish sector is uppermost in our mind here.

Looking further ahead, the Government is also committed to securing the best trade deals for the UK, with concerted efforts being made with partner countries to transition existing EU-third country Free Trade Agreements.

We now have the necessary legislation in place to ensure that in a NO Deal scenario the same rules will apply from Day One as apply today and we will ensure that we have a functioning legislative framework in place.

The Fisheries Bill will enable us to amend policies over time and embeds our commitments to sustainability. In looking at developing our future fisheries policies, we’re keen to take our time to consult properly, pilot where appropriate and be mindful of unintended consequences. But also learn the lessons from the rigid and cumbersome CFP by being able to move faster.

It is vital that we are able to protect our waters to ensure that fishing vessels continue to fish legally and sustainably, to enable trade in fish to be maintained and to meet our obligations as a responsible, independent coastal state. The Marine Management Organisation is recruiting and training more marine enforcement officers and support staff. We are bringing in significantly increased levels of surface aerial surveillance.

NFFO Chief Executive, Barrie Deas said, after the event:

“This was a strong show of support for the fishing industry from our legislators. The support was from both houses of Parliament and across the party spectrum. There is a widespread recognition that we have been tied into the CFP for 40 years and that set of arrangements have worked systematically, from the outset, to our disadvantage. Different routes to leave the EU are under discussion but whichever one is finally taken, leaving the EU means that the UK’s legal status changes and we will become an independent coastal state, with regulatory autonomy and the freedom to negotiate as an independent party.

The EU will, of course do everything in its power to maintain the arrangements – on access to UK waters and quota shares – which have worked to its advantage and our disadvantage for 40 years. That is why it is so important for the fishing industry to have strong support in Parliament, and across the country as we move into the next stages of Brexit.

Andrew Locker, skipper, and member of the well-known Locker fishing family from Whitby, will take over from Cornish skipper Andrew Pascoe after the Federation’s AGM in 2020. In the meantime, as Chairman-elect, will be involved in all of the NFFO’s top-level activities.

Currently, Andrew runs the shore-based side of the family firm, Locker Trawlers, and is heavily involved in training and quota management, through his role as Chairman of the East of England Fish Producers Organisation.

In a statement released after his election by the NFFO’s Executive Committee, Andrew said:

“I feel honoured to have been elected to this vitally important role, at this crucial time in our industry’s history. I will use all of my abilities to repay the confidence that has been invested in me. The NFFO’s membership is broad and diverse, reflecting the industry that it serves, and I personally feel that it is important that every part of it has an opportunity to shape its future.”

‘I am extremely fortunate to be following in the footsteps of experienced hands such as Tony Delahunty and Andrew Pascoe, and I have a year as Chairman-elect, before I step up to the hot seat. I know, professionally, how important training and experience is, and so I will be using this period well.”

NFFO Chief Executive, Barrie Deas, said:

“We are fortunate to have a pool of leadership talent within the Federation to draw on. Andrew will make an excellent Chairman, when the time comes. Nothing is more important in the current circumstances, than having wise counsel and guidance at the top of the NFFO in its dealings with government.”

NFFO

March 2019

Enforcement

One trajectory, characterised by prosecution cases based on VMS evidence conjure up images of enforcement officers sat at computer screens picking out rule breakers in a space invaders style game without the need to leave the comfort of a padded office chair.

Undoubtedly, while many see electronic monitoring as a boon in aiding the prevention of unlawful activities and ensuring they are brought to justice, in the case of VMS it is not the same as a visual inspection of wrongdoing. The data shows only position, speed and heading, not whether illegal fishing is taking place. It, therefore, needs to be corroborated, not used as a foregone conclusion of an offence, whether to secure a prosecution or to trigger a fixed administrative penalty. Without this, there is a risk of false prosecution.

There are numerous legitimate reasons why a vessel may need to be in a management area and making headway at a similar speed to that when fishing; avoiding tide, weather or shipping, waiting for a closed area to open, dealing with a breakdown, or simply just resting, to name but a few. Until additional technology that can verify whether fishing activity is taking place is introduced, these are the limitations of current technology and the usual evidential standards have to be met.

Even when evidence is considered sufficient, enforcement policy needs to also be applied proportionately, including education and warning options, as well as staged sanctioning.

Spatial Management

Recent VMS enforcement cases are at the vanguard of policing the growing extent of spatial fisheries regulations. As well as the extension of VMS systems to the inshore fleet, control of fishing in and around marine protected areas is about to get a lot more expansive and complex as measures are progressively rolled out across our seas.

This rollout has yet to be accompanied by aids that will help skippers to navigate the measures. In time, a new initiative by Seafish aims to address this, but as it stands, multiple lists of coordinates in byelaws are all that exist to inform of management boundaries, leaving it to fishermen to enter into their navigation systems in order to make sense of them.

Under these circumstances, the approach to enforcement is critical. Get it wrong and the consequences extend beyond the immediate victims of rough justice. It is likely that many would become wary of entering management areas or making headway at speeds lower than 6 knots, unnecessarily compromising operational freedom and potentially safety. The prospect of heavy legal costs if faced with prosecution may persuade some to plead guilty or accept a fine when given the choice, when in fact they are innocent.

Partnership Building

In contrast to an alienating and remote control form of enforcement is the careful work that has been going on for a number of years between government, scientists and the fishing industry to develop and test bottom-up schemes that seek to involve the industry in tackling some of the more knotty fisheries management challenges.

A good example is the MMO Fully Documented Fisheries Scheme that aids the prevention of unwanted discards, and a similar initiative is ongoing to address unwanted catches of spurdog. These types of collaborative approaches may also provide a relevant model for tackling cetacean and bird bycatch in the future.

The NFFO is an enthusiastic supporter of these collaborative approaches which we believe can demonstrate practical conservation results by working with the grain of maintaining a profitable fishing business and enable industry to get involved and demonstrate responsible marine stewardship.

This requires the building of trust and cooperation between managers and industry, where electronic data gathering and monitoring provides a knowledge base that in turn can facilitate adaptive management approaches. Investment in time and effort is needed on all sides and results may take a number of years to come to fruition as baseline evidence is gathered and trials proved before measures can be applied more widely and benefits realised. This work can then inform how to best frame policy and regulation in order to support best practice.

In an environment that is inherently uncertain and data and knowledge expensive to obtain, giving industry confidence to generate knowledge for the common good should underpin successful fisheries management policy to ensure that management measures are more practical, effective and sustainable.

Culture Clash

Developing a culture of cooperation will not be realised if electronic data is used within a shoot-first-ask-questions-later style of enforcement, leaving it to the courts to do the questioning, and obliging small businesses, even if found innocent, to bear the stress and potentially crippling costs of defending themselves. Such an approach will only serve to generate distrust and an “us and them” culture, persuading industry that it should only ever give the minimum information away and be continually looking over the shoulder so not to fall foul of the authorities. Trust built up can be easily lost.

Getting to grips with how electronic monitoring data on fishing activities should be applied alongside other evidence in enforcement actions, and considering what constitutes sufficient evidence in order to justify a particular course of action is essential, and clarity is needed if the cooperative path between industry and managers is to be realised.

Under European Commission (EC) contingency proposals to enable it to grant our fishing vessels access to European Union (EU) waters in certain circumstances after Brexit, UK boats will be required to be registered with the International Maritime Organisation (IMO).

While future access to fish in EU and other coastal State waters in the event of a no deal scenario remains a matter for negotiation, UK fishermen who want to prepare for all EU exit scenarios should apply for an IMO number now.

IMO registration is free and all UK fishing vessels will have to submit their IMO number to the Single Issuing Authority being established by the Marine Management Organisation (MMO) – on behalf of the UK Fisheries Administrations – to manage licensing for commercial fishing in non-UK waters.

Download the IMO registration application form. Fishing vessel owners should complete the form and send it to ship.imo@ihs.com.

When fishermen have received their IMO number they should email it to UKSIA@marinemanagement.org.uk along with their Port Letter and Number (PLN) and Registry of Shipping and Seamen (RSS) number.

Fishermen whose vessels already have IMO numbers should send the details to the MMO, via UKSIA@marinemanagement.org.uk, so accurate records can be maintained.

Barrie Deas, Chief Executive of the NFFO said:

“The closed areas have worked well and, after a few teething troubles, have been honoured by all parties throughout the whole year.

It has been agreed to roll-over the important closed area in the Thames Estuary without change. We have agreed to replace the two East Anglian closures with a single area of equivalent size but running parallel to the coast between the 12 limit and a line 18 miles out. The feeling is that this will give more protection to the inshore fisheries on that coast.”

“This is an industry-to-industry agreement, acknowledging that the arrival of pulse fishing has meant a greater concentration of effort in areas traditionally fished by the small boat fleets and trying to find ways at a practical level to reduce the scope for frictions. The areas selected have been chosen by fishermen familiar with the fisheries concerned.”

Pim Visser, Chief Executive of VisNed said, “Whilst the bigger questions about the future of pulse fishing are being worked out, we acknowledged the fears and concerns about the inshore fishermen and have acted to address them. A delegation of Dutch fishermen travelled to London in January and we reviewed how the closed areas had worked during the previous year. The conclusion was that these were valuable arrangements but could be improved with a little refinement. It means that our boats will have to adjust their fishing patterns but we think that it is worth it to demonstrate our goodwill and ability to work together. We all have to earn a living and it is important to find ways to coexist.”

The recent ban on pulse fishing, adopted as part of the EU technical conservation regulation will not come into effect until June 2021 and there will continue to be some level of use of the method on an experimental basis, albeit at a much lower level. The voluntary closed areas will, therefore, continue to have relevance for some time.

View the 2019 agreement

Within the corridors of Westminster, another battle is raging. This one is over how the principle of maximum sustainable yield should be applied to our fisheries after the UK has left the EU and CFP.

The Fisheries Bill is passing through Parliament and battle is engaged for parliamentarians’ favour in both the Commons and the Lords. On the one side, are fisheries managers, the fishing industry and fisheries scientists, and on the other, the environmental NGOs and their sympathisers, who are pressing a one-dimensional view of fisheries management. If successful this would inadvertently, increase the risk that some of our most important fisheries would be closed down.

MSY: a useful yardstick/a dangerous dogma

MSY is a convenient yardstick to measure whether fish stocks are being fished at sustainable levels. It involves establishing biological and harvesting reference points for each stock as a metric for the fishing levels which would secure maximum benefits from each stock. The concept, however, was never designed to be applied in mixed fisheries where a range of species, each with different conservation status, are caught together. Useful when used as an aspiration, applied in a dogmatic way, MSY can become an obstacle to sustainable fisheries management.

MSY was adopted as a political objective at the World Summit on Sustainable Development, in Johannesburg in 2002. Since then it has been used as a shorthand yardstick for sustainability. And since 2013, after extensive lobbying by the environmental NGOs, it has been a legal requirement within the CFP, with a deadline to have all harvested species consistent with MSY by 2020. MSY therefore comes into play when quotas for each species are set each year, based on scientific advice produced by the International Council for Exploration of the Seas (ICES).

ICES produce single species advice for each stock to meet the European Commission’s request for advice expressed in an Administrative Agreement. The form of that request is important. Even though, since 2000, fishing pressure across all of the main species groups has been falling dramatically and stocks have been rebuilding steadily, scientists when asked what level of catch is consistent with achieving MSY by 2020, for a handful of stocks can only provide one possible answer: zero catch. And that is a problem for mixed fisheries under the landing obligation.

Mixed Fisheries

In the real world of mixed fisheries, fisheries managers are faced with a range of objectives. Management decisions for each stock are always based on the scientific advice but trade-offs between the different objectives require compromises. These include:

• Building or maintaining the biomass of each stock to MSY, bearing in mind that even without human intervention, the abundance of any given fish stocks will fluctuate in response to different environmental signals: once a stock is at MSY, there is no guarantee that it will stay there, even with low fishing pressure.
• Reducing discards, or as there is now a discard ban/landing obligation, avoiding chokes, where the exhaustion of one quota would close fisheries for other economically important species
• Maintaining the viability of fishing businesses and fishing communities, often through a staged approach to rebuilding stocks to avoid the worst socio-economic impacts when below average recruitment means that quotas have to be reduced

Setting quotas within this context is complex. Multiple objectives require difficult trade-offs. The introduction of the EU landing obligation, which requires all quota species to be landed unless there is a specific exemption, raises the stakes because of the risk of chokes, when the exhaustion of quota for one species will mean that a vessel cannot retain any more of that species but neither can the species be landed because there is no quota to cover that landing. A classic Catch 22.

In recognition of these kind of management dilemmas, the EU introduced the concept of fishing mortality ranges (F-ranges) into their management plans, in the teeth of strenuous opposition from the more purist NGOs and their allies in the European Parliament. F-ranges are not a panacea for chokes, but they do provide fisheries managers with a little more flexibility to set quotas in mixed fisheries. Even the European Commission, the body charged with overseeing implementation of EU fisheries law, has been noticeably reluctant to give full force to the MSY principle in its proposals – because of the consequences of following a one-dimensional path.

MSY in the Fisheries Bill

The central purpose of the Fisheries Bill, currently making its way through Parliament, is to provide UK fisheries ministers with the authority to set quotas and control access to UK waters after the UK departs the EU. It also contains a range of broad objectives, including one to maintain fish stocks in line with the MSY principle. What is missing by contrast with the Common Fisheries Policy, is the requirement to set quotas for all harvested stocks at MSY by 2020.

This has been done for good reason. A hard, legal obligation to set quotas at MSY, irrespective of the circumstances, would tie managers’ hands in dealing with the necessary trade-offs described above. Removing the arbitrary deadline provides fisheries management with a degree of flexibility to manage mixed fisheries whilst still maintain the commitment to set quotas at levels which generate maximum sustainable benefits.

The NGOs argue that this change represents a dilution of the UK’s commitment to the EU’s sustainability standards. It is a deceptively simple but dangerous argument. Because it is simple – and the counter argument is rather complex – it is gaining traction in Parliament.

Consequences

The EU landing obligation, which came fully into force in January 2019, requires all quota species to be landed and counted against quota. For fisheries in which the scientific advice for one species caught in a mixed fishery is for zero catch of that species, this poses a dilemma. A species caught as unavoidable bycatch could close the whole fishery prematurely. Applied legalistically, the MSY principle, alongside the requirements of the landing obligation, would potentially mean closing whole fisheries in January for the rest of the year. In concrete terms, had this approach been applied for the quotas set in December 2018, for the 2019 fishery, applying the MSY principle within the context of the landing obligation would mean the immediate closure of:

• The West of Scotland demersal fisheries
• The Irish Sea Nephrops fisheries
• The Celtic Sea demersal fisheries.

This drastic action would be required because there is scientific advice for zero catch, respectively, for cod, whiting and cod in these fisheries. Put plainly, following a rigid interpretation of MSY at the 2018 December Council would have meant catastrophic social and economic consequences for thousands of fishing businesses and hundreds of fishing communities in Western Waters. The more purist NGOs could perhaps afford to be blasé about such an outcome but clearly ministers baulked at taking responsibility for such carnage. In the event, a difficult compromise was found.

MSY as a slogan

The NGOs would have us believe that all that is needed to achieve sustainable fisheries is political will. The beauty of this formulae is its simplicity. The appeal is to the general public and politicians who, understandably, know little of the complexities of managing mixed fisheries within the context of zero catch advice and the landing obligation. But reducing MSY to a slogan is dangerous.

Embedded as a hard, legal, requirement, with an arbitrary timetable, would:

• Limit fisheries managers’ ability to achieve optimum outcomes,
• Be impossible to achieve consistently from a biological point of view, as humans cannot control spawning success or the recruitment of young fish to the fishery each year
• Make international fisheries negotiations dance around a scientifically illiterate legal requirement
• Carry potentially dire social and economic consequences

None of these would be the intention but they would be the consequences of an inflexible, one-dimensional approach to MSY. The fishing industry has a deep interest in a management system that delivers high long-term yields of commercial species. ICES science demonstrates that great progress has been made in achieving this objective across all the main species groups. As the UK leaves the EU it makes sense to retain MSY as a principle, as an aspiration, and as an objective – but the consequences of giving it primacy over all other considerations would be disastrous.