I
Ian Cloke
Guest
Recreational fishing gap in Commission's Maritime Policy Green Paper
Written By: EAA and EFTTA press release
On Date: 11/6/2006
On Wednesday, the European Commission unveiled its ambitious Green Paper on a future maritime policy, which aims to integrate strategies covering all marine-related activities in order to boost competitiveness and growth.
Recreational angling ? fishing with rod and line for non-commercial purposes- fits perfectly well with all aspects of the rationale behind the Green Paper: sustainable development ?to ensure mutual reinforcement of economic growth, social welfare and environmental protection.?
Therefore, it was a stunning surprise to find how little attention is paid to recreational angling in the Green Paper, and the aspect of our sport the Commission chose to focus on. In a very few sentences -written in rather polemic form- we are told on page 30, that:
'One important relationship in the context of leisure activities is that between angling and fisheries. The European Anglers Alliance states that Europe has an estimated 8-10 million recreational anglers at sea with a related industry of ? 8 to 10 billion. There seems little doubt that the value to the coastal economy of a fish caught by an angler exceeds the value of the same fish caught for commercial purposes by a fishing boat. On the other hand it is understandable that fishermen demand that restrictions on the taking of certain fish for conservation purposes are also applied to sport fishers, particularly when the latter use similar fishing gear to professional fishermen. These issues require further study and consideration.'
We find it a bit odd that the Commission feels obliged to use this ridiculously short angling chapter to express its understanding of commercial fishermen?s emotional claims. However, a more important point is that these few lines show that neither the Commission nor the commercial fishermen seem to have grasped that there are different kinds of recreational fishing and that recreational anglers are certainly not the ones using ?similar fishing gear to professional fishermen?. Recreational fishermen using nets on the sea bed or from a boat and the recreational long liners are the ones who should be addressed in this regard, not anglers!
Continued......
Written By: EAA and EFTTA press release
On Date: 11/6/2006
On Wednesday, the European Commission unveiled its ambitious Green Paper on a future maritime policy, which aims to integrate strategies covering all marine-related activities in order to boost competitiveness and growth.
Recreational angling ? fishing with rod and line for non-commercial purposes- fits perfectly well with all aspects of the rationale behind the Green Paper: sustainable development ?to ensure mutual reinforcement of economic growth, social welfare and environmental protection.?
Therefore, it was a stunning surprise to find how little attention is paid to recreational angling in the Green Paper, and the aspect of our sport the Commission chose to focus on. In a very few sentences -written in rather polemic form- we are told on page 30, that:
'One important relationship in the context of leisure activities is that between angling and fisheries. The European Anglers Alliance states that Europe has an estimated 8-10 million recreational anglers at sea with a related industry of ? 8 to 10 billion. There seems little doubt that the value to the coastal economy of a fish caught by an angler exceeds the value of the same fish caught for commercial purposes by a fishing boat. On the other hand it is understandable that fishermen demand that restrictions on the taking of certain fish for conservation purposes are also applied to sport fishers, particularly when the latter use similar fishing gear to professional fishermen. These issues require further study and consideration.'
We find it a bit odd that the Commission feels obliged to use this ridiculously short angling chapter to express its understanding of commercial fishermen?s emotional claims. However, a more important point is that these few lines show that neither the Commission nor the commercial fishermen seem to have grasped that there are different kinds of recreational fishing and that recreational anglers are certainly not the ones using ?similar fishing gear to professional fishermen?. Recreational fishermen using nets on the sea bed or from a boat and the recreational long liners are the ones who should be addressed in this regard, not anglers!
Continued......