News
May 4, 2010
Singing Sensation: 10 Fishermen No.7 on British charts
Not exactly a boy band, more of a “buoy band”, 10 rugged Cornwall fishermen have launched a singing group career that has only just started with a one million pound recording contract. It was a scene as taken from a sentimental movie: The Fisherman’s Friends were discovered following a pub gig by the same label … Continued
May 3, 2010
NGO statement told EU to scale down
Describing the upcoming CFP reform as an “once-in-a-decade opportunity”, close to a dozen NGOs told the EU Fisheries ministers to promote a shift to “appropriately-scaled, community-based fisheries” when the new policy is taking shape. The ministers were gathered for an informal meeting in the Spanish fishing stronghold of Vigo on May 4-5. Welcoming the Commission’s … Continued
May 2, 2010
“La Coruña Declaration” says small is very good
More than 70 NGOs, fishermen’s organisations and other stakeholders have signed a declaration calling for the European Union to put small-scale coastal fisheries “at the heart of the CFP reform”. At the meeting in the Spanish Atlantic fishing port of La Coruña, NGOs and organisations of artisanal, or small-scale, coastal fishers agreed to work together … Continued
May 2, 2010
Declaration is followed by promising meeting
The first, possibly ground-breaking, steps in a future hand-in-hand walk between NGOs and small-scale fishermen were taken at a meeting in Spain in late April. The meeting in the Galician port of La Coruña, set off with a joint declaration urging EU decision-makers to set small-scale coastal fisheries “at the heart” of the upcoming reform … Continued
April 28, 2010
Sinking fisheries in Eastern Canada
Newfoundland and Labrador, a Canadian province already hit hard by the cod stock collapse in the early 1990s, has reported a sharp decline in the value of its seafood industry last year. The 22 percent decrease, to a €617 million total, was however mainly caused by the global recession and the strengthened Canadian dollar in … Continued
April 22, 2010
Norwegian institute stakes out ”fishing of the future”
Capture-based aquaculture – saving the catches in cages to be butchered and sold when most advantageous market-wise – is hailed by a Norwegian scientist as “the fishing method of the future”. “If you catch 100 tonnes of wild cod in April, you can sell 200 tonnes in December”, says Kjell Ø. Midling, a senior scientist … Continued
April 21, 2010
Fungi may make healthfood for fish
Farmed fungi fed on biproducts from a pulp mill will make aquaculture more sustainable, Swedish scientists hope. From an ecological viewpoint, a major problem with aquaculture has been that it takes considerably more wild fish to feed the farmed fish than what you get out of the production, generally by a two-to-one ratio; the caught … Continued
April 20, 2010
COM summarises CFP responses
The EU Commission has published a compilation of 382 responses received to its Green Paper on CFP reform, originally scheduled to be presented at the cancelled April Council meeting. The Council meeting was cancelled due to the air traffic problems caused by volcanic ashes. The new Common Fisheries Policy, expected to be hammered out in … Continued
April 20, 2010
Nothing Holy, no more
Submitting to the fact that fisheries have gone down in sustainability since Jesus and his disciples were around, the Israeli government has imposed a two-year ban on all fishing in the Sea of Galilee. The fish stocks in the Sea of Galilee – actually a freshwater lake and Israel’s main source of water – have … Continued
April 15, 2010
CFP responses to be presented, discussed in Council meeting
A preliminary compilation of 382 responses to the CFP Green Paper will be presented by the Commission at the upcoming April Council meeting. The ten-year Common Fisheries Policy (CFP) is up for a renewal to take force in 2013, and the Commission opened the gates to the official decision-making process by publishing a Green Paper … Continued