EU Aims to Save Threatened North Sea Sole, Plaice
Date: 11-Jan-06
Country: BELGIUM
A long-term plan presented by the European Commission on Tuesday targets fishing fleets from five EU countries with measures that aim for 10 percent fewer fish caught each year until the numbers of both species return to sustainable levels.
"Fishing for sole involves a lot of accidental catches of plaice. Both stocks are overfished," Mireille Thom, the Commission's fisheries spokeswoman, told a news briefing.
"The fleets concerned come from the Netherlands, Germany, Belgium, the UK and Denmark," she said.
The Commission's proposal will be presented to EU fisheries ministers in the next few months for their approval.
Scientists say plaice stocks in the North Sea are worryingly low since fishermen discard so many of the fish, to the extent that the species may already have problems reproducing itself.
Sole, at current fishing rates, "is expected to fall outside safe biological limits in 2007," the Commission said in a statement, implying that the species might disappear in the North Sea if current trawling practices were not curbed.
To boost the species' chances of recovery, fleets would be limited in the number of days they could spend at sea fishing for sole or plaice, it said. Imposing such limits has become standard EU practice in recent years to prevent overfishing.
And to minimise short-term disruption to coastal communities that depend on fishing for their livelihood, the Commission would not recommend cuts, or increases, to annual permitted catches of more than 15 percent than the previous year.
