[WATCH] 60% of EU’s fisheries demands depend on imports

Karmenu Vella discusses Fisheries policy update

At a meeting with the Malta-EU Steering Actions Committee (MEUSAC) and Social Dialogue Minister Helena Dalli, European Commissioner Karmenu Vella spoke about the revision of the Common Fisheries Policy (CFP) and the changes in the direction of the present European Commission, which came into force in 2014.

"The CFP, which has been a key policy for the EU fisheries sector, since its beginnings in the 1970s, has undergone various modifications over the years, following a process of review every ten years," Vella said.

Vella stressed the change in the discard regulations, which stipulated that any by-catch, would ultimately be discarded back into the sea, even if they had already died. As a result, under this regulation, the EU is estimated to have discarded around 1.7 million tonnes of fish. This was seen as highly contradictory to the fact that the EU met 60% of its fisheries demands through imports and following the revision of this regulation, all fish caught have to be landed.

“This is just one in a series of changes we have had planned,” Vella said.

“The Commission focuses on three main sectors of fisheries; Fishing, aquaculture (which includes fish farming) and the greatest of the sectors, processing, which is four times greater than the fishing sector," he added.

Vella said that the EU had also made progress with respect to Illegal, Unreported and Unregulated fishing (IUU).

“There are still, however four areas that need to be addressed which include, vessels used, the flag used by the vessels, the areas where fishing is taking place and the ports where illegally caught fish are landed,” Vella said.

“The approach towards IUU’s in the EU has been so successful that the US is currently in talks to follow the EU’s example.”

Vella also discussed the European Commission’s general change in direction.

“This new Commission has been different from its very start, with the unprecedented election of the President of the Commission. The new commission wants to change the idea of Brussels as a legislation machine, as it has recognized that we need to overview the legislations introduced to understand their effectiveness,” Vella said.

“The new Commission is also committed to focus on employment, economic growth and investment rather than austerity measures as the previous commission did.”