Super trawlers are proving to be a rather elusive management issue. There are no lack of concerns about their impact as the latest campaign from the world cetacean alliance highlights concerns over the dolphin bycatch. These two recent Parliamentary Questions and answers don’t really get to the heart of the matter.
1.Virginia Crosbie Con for Ynys Mon: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, if he will take steps to require supertrawlers operating within UK waters to (a) publish catch records, including species discard, (b) report dolphin or other sensitive species bycatch and (c) be transparent with data so that consumer labelling can accurately identify seafood caught using sustainable fishing methods and minimised bycatch.
Victoria Prentis Minister of State for the Environment, Defra The Marine Management Organisation publishes annual statistics on catch, effort and fleet data in aggregated from which includes catch by gear type:
https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/marine-management-organisation/about/statistics. The UK discard/bycatch information, derived from scientific fisheries observer programmes in each of the UK administrations, is the EU Scientific, Technical and Economic Committee for Fisheries (STECF) database. Data collected up to the end of 2020 have been submitted to the EU STECF in accordance with UK obligations and can be found here: Fisheries Dependent Information – European Commission (europa.eu)
All wild-capture commercial fishers are required to report incidental mortality or injury (bycatch) of marine mammals during fishing operations to the Marine Management Organisation. These data are used in UK bycatch monitoring programmes to help identify and where possible reduce potential impacts with sensitive marine species. The UK government funds a comprehensive and well-respected bycatch monitoring programme, which provides essential observer data on incidents of sensitive species bycatch. Annual reports are published online here: Defra, UK – Science Search.
UK regulations require fishery and aquaculture product labelling to indicate the production method, area where the product was caught or farmed, and category of fishing gear used in capture of fisheries.
Virginia Crosbie, Conservative for Ynys Mon To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps he is taking to reduce the incidence of dolphin and other sensitive species bycatch; and whether he has plans to ban supertrawlers from UK waters in order to reduce the bycatch from unsustainable fishing practices.
Victoria Prentis Minister of State for the Environment, Defra The Government is fully committed to tackling the issue of accidental bycatch of sensitive marine species, as seen in the Fisheries Act through the ecosystem objective which seeks to ensure “incidental catches of sensitive marine species are minimised and, where possible, eliminated”. The Joint Fisheries Statement and UK Bycatch Mitigation Initiative will set out policies in more detail to help achieve this objective, including improving our understanding of where and how much bycatch occurs and effective mitigation measures to reduce bycatch of sensitive marine species.
We are currently examining our wider policy on supertrawlers. Any action needs to be evidence-based and in line with the UK/EU Trade and Cooperation Agreement. The Marine Management Organisation continues to monitor fishing activity in English waters with dedicated enforcement and surveillance work to protect fisheries, including offshore patrol vessels for at-sea surveillance.
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