Brexit: EU fish catches to be slashed! (4k)

When I saw this it shocked me, I showed it to someone who knows a lot about fisheries, and it shocked him too!

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Brexit: EU fish catches to be slashed!

Sources:

https://www.consilium.europa.e....u/media/47557/main-t

https://www.consilium.europa.e....u/media/47558/deep-s

While these Brexit talks have been going on, fisheries have been up, front and centre as the central issue. With politicians and pundits from both sides using it as the biggest Brexit football on the pitch.

And President Macron of France has been prancing about the place talking about protecting the French fishing community from Brexit decimation.

However, the EU has released its fishing catch allowances for 2021, and the news for EU fishermen will be dire.

And I have to ask how this was kept under such tight wraps over the last few days and weeks when usually such stuff would be either trailed or leaked.

And one also suspects the UK media would also have heard about it. But they seem to have played along with this.

The bottom line is that, as far as I can see, the EU is slashing huge swathes off various total allowable catches (TACs) by as much as 75%. All due to previous overfishing.

That's not reduced to 75% of last year, but by 75% off of last year. That is, reduced to a quarter of this year's next year.

For example:

Great Silver Smelt in EU waters 3 and 4, using figures to adjust out the UK share, the TAC will drop from 1,214 in 2020 to just 304 in 2021, a reduction of 75%.

And Sandeel in EU waters 2a,3a and 4(1) will drop from 228,837 in 2020 to zero in 2021. A fall of 100%.

I've left links to them in the descriptions box below.

When I pointed out these figures to a contact I know to be an expert in this area and asked him to comment, he basically said it was shocking. Not shocking for the fish, but shocking for those whose livelihoods depend on fishing.

The above figures come from a list of 31 pages of fish types and sea areas where, apart from a few that have been increased marginally, stay the same or drop marginally, most of them are in the minus 75% zone.

And many have been dropped down to zero.

I can't find any figures for the Mediterranean, but given concerns there I expect the same will happen there, if it hasn't already.

Now, just about every Brexit negotiator on the EU side will have been or should have been aware of this. And I also suspect the same could be said of those on the UK side.

So why do we only hear about this the day it looks like Boris Johnson is pulling the trigger on a no-deal Brexit.

To say that I feel we've been played somewhat is an understatement.

Are these figures going to come as an extremely nasty shock for the EU fishing community? Was the EU going to blame it all on Brexit?

But further, it also says to me that the UK may well be following the same route. Because the UK government has made no moves towards beefing up our fishing capabilities.

So maybe the UK will start this huge ramping down of fishing as well.

That means Brexit or no Brexit, deal or no deal there might be a hugely reduced set of quotas for vessels operating in the UK Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) anyway.

Or, another explanation is that the EU was keeping this well hidden from the UK. That way, they could slash the fishing effort in their own areas and pile it into ours.

Anyway, the EU Commissioner with responsibilities in this area, Virginijus Sinkevičius, said in a statement earlier this morning:

"The stakes of the negotiations were very high, as we needed to address all three sustainability pillars."

But the ecologists will be pleased that these reductions will give the oceans a reprieve from factory fishing.

But for me, the questions are really around the politics of all of this.

And also that some politicians, notably Macron and Boris Johnson, may end up with egg on their faces with this, if fishing is being reduced massively across both the UK and EU EEZs.

After all the promises of protecting coastal communities, and in the case of Boris increasing their lot, we might see further reductions.

And I would bet a pound to a pinch of sugar, that they will both say they are following the science.

That sounds familiar.

Now, whoever knew what and when about this, looking at it from a UK angle, I just want our coastal communities to emerge in good shape.

4k. 4k video.

#Brexit

#Fisheries

#Brexittalks