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Row erupts over EU tuna fishing quotas
Source: Agencies |
November 19, 2010, Friday
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EUROPE'S Mediterranean fishing nations have rejected measures to protect the endangered bluefin tuna, proposed last month by the European Union fishing chief Maria Damanaki, EU officials said yesterday.
The decision means the 27-nation EU joins international quota talks in Paris this week without a mandate for negotiating measures to conserve the fish, whose numbers have declined by more than half over the last 40 years.
The EU was seen as a key champion of Atlantic bluefin, which can grow to the size of an average horse, accelerate faster than a sports car and can fetch US$100,000 each at market in Japan, where they are prized by sushi?lovers.
The total bluefin quota for 2010 was set at 13,500 tonnes (13,286 tons) and Damanaki said last month that to give the giant fish a real chance of °?recovery, the 2011 quota should be set at around 6,000 tons at the Paris meeting of the International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tunas.
Damanaki accepted that the need to protect the livelihoods of fishermen would probably dictate a higher quota than 6,000 tonnes. But in a meeting late on Wednesday, EU ambassadors in Brussels, led by France, rebuffed the proposal and wrote their own, which barely mentions quota reductions at all.
"Nevertheless, the Commission will respect its obligations as the negotiator on behalf of the European Union," °?Damanaki responded in a tersely worded statement.
"It's a bad start," said Remi Parmentier, an advisor to the United States-based Pew Environment Group. "Here we have a real test-case of the EU putting words into action for reforming fisheries."
The decision means the 27-nation EU joins international quota talks in Paris this week without a mandate for negotiating measures to conserve the fish, whose numbers have declined by more than half over the last 40 years.
The EU was seen as a key champion of Atlantic bluefin, which can grow to the size of an average horse, accelerate faster than a sports car and can fetch US$100,000 each at market in Japan, where they are prized by sushi?lovers.
The total bluefin quota for 2010 was set at 13,500 tonnes (13,286 tons) and Damanaki said last month that to give the giant fish a real chance of °?recovery, the 2011 quota should be set at around 6,000 tons at the Paris meeting of the International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tunas.
Damanaki accepted that the need to protect the livelihoods of fishermen would probably dictate a higher quota than 6,000 tonnes. But in a meeting late on Wednesday, EU ambassadors in Brussels, led by France, rebuffed the proposal and wrote their own, which barely mentions quota reductions at all.
"Nevertheless, the Commission will respect its obligations as the negotiator on behalf of the European Union," °?Damanaki responded in a tersely worded statement.
"It's a bad start," said Remi Parmentier, an advisor to the United States-based Pew Environment Group. "Here we have a real test-case of the EU putting words into action for reforming fisheries."
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