Work on a joint recommendation for a Baltic discard ban plan has continued among the Baltic Member States throughout the spring. In mid-May, a revised version of the earlier drafts was circulated by BALTFISH to stakeholders, such as the Baltic Sea Advisory Council.
Yesterday Swedish Agency for Marine and Water Management (SwAM) hosted its annual Marine and Water Forum in Gothenburg, Sweden. Reduced eutrophication, increased biodiversity in running water and sustainable fishing was on the agenda during this year’s forum.
The European Commissions report on Member States’ efforts during 2012 to achieve a sustainable balance between fishing capacity and fishing opportunities shows some progress towards achieving a balance with the available fishing opportunities.
Last week scientist and experts meet in Stockholm to discuss the possibilities of developing a Baltic Sea Health Index as a tool on how to best measure the Baltic Sea’s health and track its improvements.
The European Commission under the Maritime Affairs and Fisheries have opened a public consultation on seabed mining to gather the public’s opinions concerning seabed mining developments as a way to help EU develop its position on the issue.
The European Commission announced yesterday that they want to prohibit the use of any kind of driftnets for fishing in all EU waters as of 1 January 2015.
Last week the Swedish Society for Nature Conservation gathered the Swedish candidates running for the European Parliament to see where they stand on environmental issues. We checked in to hear what they had to say on fisheries.
The HELCOM fisheries and Environment Forum held a meeting in Riga where among other things the HELCOM ambitions and plans on how to increase the cooperation with ICES on fish and fisheries related issues were presented.
On 5 May, exactly 10 years after the official launch, FISH highlighted key achievements and marked the end of the CFP reform and work with OCEAN2012 at a seminar in Stockholm.
An elaborated draft of Fisheries control strategy were presented by Sweden and Denmark presented proposed Terms of References for fisheries management in Natura 2000 areas. Finally, some aspects of the impending multi-species plan for the Baltic Sea were briefly discussed.