House of Lords - European Union

Select Committee on European Union Third Report

PART 3: THE COMMITTEE'S CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS

OBJECTIVES OF THE REFORMED COMMON FISHERIES POLICY

80. The Common Fisheries Policy has failed to establish sustainable fisheries in European waters. Successive meetings of the Council of Fisheries Ministers over many years acted with insufficient decisiveness to put in place the necessary measures. While in recent years the scale of the problem has been more widely recognised, we still await the radical overhaul of the CFP that is clearly overdue.

81. Much of the failure of the existing CFP can be attributed to a lack of cohesion between the four strands of policy. There is little point in seeking to improve management procedures, for example by introducing new consultative or even decision-making arrangements at regional or zonal level, without also ensuring that the problems relating to the structure of the European fishing industry are addressed.

82. The Green Paper, to be published early in 2001, may be the last opportunity to put in place a single coherent policy, containing all four of those strands, which addresses the issues in a way which imparts confidence that the long term interests of the marine environment and the fisheries sector are being adequately met.

83. The Committee would expect the Green Paper to set out the medium and long term objectives of a reformed CFP after December 2002. We agree with the JNCC, IEEP and others that the key objective should be that of sustainable development. We therefore recommend that the priority objective of the CFP, to which all other objectives must conform, should be:

To ensure that the exploitation of marine resources takes account not only of ecological processes but also social and economic consequences.[

84. This priority objective recognises the need to adopt ecosystem based management systems with which all other CFP objectives designed to meet social and economic interests must be compatible. It is in the long term interest both of the fisheries sector and the marine environment that the CFP should seek to protect, conserve and assist in the restoration of ecosystems and the biological diversity of European waters. For these reasons, and others which we discuss in paragraph 100, we believe it is essential that fisheries management within the Community should be organised on a regional or zonal basis.

85. We summarise the other most important objectives as follows:

To achieve a balance in each fishing zone between the fishing capacity of the Member States with fishing rights and the size of the fish resources available to them.
To put in place management regimes in each zone which promote sustainable fisheries, using whatever measures are best adapted to local circumstances.
To recognise the particular environmental and socio-economic attributes of inshore fisheries in coastal waters.
To expand and make more accessible socio-economic restructuring support for fishing communities where fishing capacity is reduced, and to introduce short-term transitional assistance to alleviate the immediate economic consequences of the introduction of more rigorous conservation measures.
To promote the market for fish from sustainable European fisheries.
To promote aquaculture and innovative fish farming techniques which are compatible with best practice and which take full account of biodiversity considerations.
To promote sustainable fisheries in third countries waters where the Community has fisheries agreements as well as in international waters.

PROTECTION OF THE MARINE ENVIRONMENT

86. There must be a much more effective liaison between DG Fisheries and DG Environment. The whole ecosystem of the oceans is greatly affected by fisheries activities. It is vital that continuous attention is paid to the problems of the ecosystem and that they are addressed directly by both DGs.

87. We are particularly concerned that coherence be improved between CFP measures and environmental measures. The direct linkage that now exists under the Common Agricultural Policy, following the Agenda 2000 reforms, between agricultural support and environmental protection[27] needs to be replicated in the CFP.

88. The fisheries sector seems to be lagging behind most of the others in the "Cardiff" process of environmental integration. It is particularly critical that strategic environmental assessments are undertaken on every aspect of the Policy. If existing EU commitments to its Biodiversity Strategy are to be met there is a need to identify how the different aspects of this Strategy can be taken into account alongside the reformed Common Fisheries Policy.

CAPACITY REDUCTION

89. A future CFP must in all respects be consistent with the overriding long-term requirement to match the fishing capacity in each zone with the fish resource. While overcapacity persists there will be pressures to increase the size of the fish catch leading ultimately to unsustainable fisheries in financial and ecological terms.

90. The Science and Technology Committee's 1996 Report Fish Stock Conservation and Management found that fisheries science generally provided adequate information on stocks. The problem in the past has been the failure of the Council of Ministers to put in place adequate measures to back up the scientific findings (although the TACs agreed in the last few years were tougher than previously). There has inevitably been pressure on Fisheries Ministers to "win" a higher total catch for their own industry; and because of the principle of relative stability (see glossary in Appendix 6) this can be achieved only by increasing the TAC. This upward pressure should be eliminated by adopting transparent and quantitative medium-term management strategies for each stock.

91. The Fourth Multi-Annual Guidance Programme (MAGP IV), which runs from 1997 to 2001 (see paragraphs 39-43), has so far dismally failed to produce reductions in total EU fishing capacity, which on the contrary has continued to show net year-on-year increases.

92. The present Financial Instrument for Fisheries Guidance (FIFG) has contributed to the rebuilding and modernising of the fleet, thereby increasing capacity. Its funding for decommissioning vessels has not always had the desired effect of reducing capacity as the funds can find their way back into financing new vessels with enhanced capacity. Even some of the subsidies provided under FIFG designed to protect the environment and fish stocks, such as funding for cleaner technology, can have the effect of increasing capacity.

93. There is no logic in providing public money for fleet investment while at the same time implementing programmes of capacity reduction. Funds for new vessels should be generated from the industry itself and these will only be available when capacity has been brought into line with the fish resource.

94. The Committee recommends that the FIFG be revised so that:

No further support would be available for the modernisation and renewal of Member States' Fleets.

Support for capacity reduction would only be available when the vessel is physically scrapped. No support should be given when the decommissioned vessel is used for purposes other than fishing or is exported. Part of the payments should take the form of socio-economic restructuring support to the crew and the wider community.

Capacity reduction targets should be set at a level which more adequately reflects the status of fish stocks.

No FIFG funding in any category should be available to any Member State which has subsidised or otherwise promoted a build-up of capacity and an expansion of fishing activity.

Member States should have the power to impose environmental conditions in return for approval of funding.