Much remains to be done as regards management and control of fisheries in the Baltic, national audit institutions in the concerned states conclude in a joint report.
The audit of environmental monitoring and fisheries management/control in the Baltic Sea was conducted last year by the supreme audit institutions of Sweden, Finland, Russia, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Germany and Denmark. All those Baltic nations except Germany, Poland and Latvia participated in the second part of the study that concerned fisheries.
The joint report concludes that “a major obstacle” for the control effort is a lack of effective monitoring systems that support a risk based fisheries control, e.g. a system that controls unregistered landings. It further says that cross-checking of control data – e.g. catches entered in logbooks against sales notes – is done far from systematically and not effectively supported by electronic information systems.
The report finds “major differences” between the countries when it comes to expertise, training and control strategy, and called for close future cooperation in sharing and developing knowledge and positive experiences in the field.
It also terms as “essential” that the EU and Russia sign an agreement on cooperation in the area of fisheries and conservation of living marine resources in the Baltic.
In a highly critical report with a national perspective last fall, the Swedish Auditor General described her government’s support to the fishing industry as “artificial breathing”.