6 January 2010
One of the Federation’s priorities for January is to agree as far as possible with Defra the terms of the days at sea regime for vessels operating in the Cod Recovery Zone.
The effort control year runs from the 1st February and our overriding priority is to avoid any abrupt and disruptive closures in the coming year due to exhaustion of the UK’s allocation of Kwdays. Weather conditions permitting, a Federation delegation will be meeting Defra officials in the next few days to discuss the key aspects of next year’s regime.
These include:
- Setting the allocation of days to vessels within each gear type at a level that ensures that the annual limits are not breached but which maximises the prospects for economic viability
- Finding the least intrusive way to absorb the 25% reductions in the Irish Sea and West of Scotland and 10% cut in the North Sea dictated by the terms of the EU Cod Recovery Plan
- Finding the right balance between initial allocations and the flexibility to transfer unutilised days between vessels
- Avoiding unnecessary complications arising from the fact of devolved administration
- Maximizing the scope for buyback of effort during the coming year
At every meeting with Defra on the subject of effort control the Federation has underlined its principled opposition to the use of days at sea on both conservation and economic grounds. It is gratifying therefore that in its response to the Commission’s Green Paper on CFP reform the UK has adopted a similar position:
“…both the economic theory and practical experience show that this system [effort control] is unlikely to deliver benefits in the longer term, and results in an overcapitalised and inefficient industry with high monitoring and enforcement costs. The effort management regime for the Cod Recovery Plan has proved administratively complex and costly. As such it runs counter to the need to simplify and reduce the regulatory burden of the current CFP. Imposition of an effort regime at EU level would not be sensible and would be at odds with the need for a reformed CFP to provide greater flexibility and devolved responsibility for management of individual fisheries.”
UK Response to the European Commission Reform Green Paper on the Common Fisheries Policy Para 42