A unanimous decision by the North Pacific Fishery Management Council (NPFMC) has banned all future industrial fisheries in US waters north of the Bering Strait. The move is preventive: there are currently no large-scale commercial fisheries operating in the area, covering nearly 200,000 square miles (518,000 square kilometres), but the diminishing Arctic icecap caused by … Continued
The new European Union Action Plan for the Conservation and Management of Sharks, released by the Commission last week, has met mixed reactions from conservationist NGO’s. The Oceana organisation expressed “disappointment” that it was not as ambitious as expected, while The Shark Alliance said it represented “a great step forward for the conservation of sharks … Continued
As a part of a plan with the goal of reducing the nation’s trawler feet by a third, the Swedish Government today introduced a proposal for transferable fishing rights in pelagic fishing. According to the proposal, it will be possible for some vessels to take over allotted quotas from other fishers, thereby improving the profitability … Continued
The Gross Domestic Product (GDP) for fisheries in the Canadian province of Nova Scotia is almost back to the level before the groundfish collapse of the early 1990’s, but a new study suggests that it may mask great underlying problems, as it did two decades ago. The report, published by the Nova Scotia-based GPIAtlantic organisation, … Continued
American lobsters on the lam may constitute an ecological threat to its European cousins, experts say After more than a dozen findings along the Norwegian coast and an American lobster (Homarus americanus) was caught off Lysekil on the Swedish Skagerrak Coast last fall, the Swedish Board of Fisheries offered an award for anyone handing in … Continued
As a special feature in the new “Ocean on Google Earth” Internet program, users can check the sustainability of fish stocks. A map layer, based on information from the Marine Conservation Society (MCS), shows where in the world some of the most sustainably-sourced kinds of fish come from, and, accordingly, which fish available to consumers can … Continued
The fishing capacity for Swedish cod fishers in the Kattegat and Skagerrak and the North Sea, will be reduced by up to 25 per cent, after a new effort-management system was introduced on Feb.1. The new system, implemented under the EU Cod Recovery Plan approved by the Council last November, is based on the “kilowatt-days” … Continued
Steadily improving, but still far from perfect – that is how the EU Commission marks the member states’ annual reports on their efforts to balance fleet capacity and available fishing opportunities. The first reports submitted covered the year 2003, and in its recently published annual compilation, of reports covering 2007, the Commission concluded that the … Continued
Aiming at a 20 per cent reduction in catches, Sweden implemented new rules for eel fishing on Feb.1. The rules, varying from water to water, are included in the national management plan called for in a EU Council Regulation in 2007. The national plans were to be submitted to the Commission by the end of … Continued
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, … Continued