Call to cut number of discarded caught fish

Under current rules which govern fishing across European Union countries, fishermen have quotas for certain fish, but can carry on fishing once the limits are reached as long as they do not bring any more of that species to shore.

As a result, tonnes of edible fish which exceed the quota are thrown back to sea as “discards”, which European Fisheries Commissioner Maria Damanaki recently suggested accounted for as much as half the overall catch in some EU fisheries. The issue of wasting fish in this way is a major one, as three quarters of EU fish stocks are overfished.

In trials of the “catch quota” scheme in the UK, English fishermen catching West Channel sole and North Sea cod have to bring to land all of the fish of those species they catch so they all count as part of their quota.

While they have a larger quota than they would otherwise, once they have used it up, they have to stop fishing completely.

Onboard monitoring including the use of CCTV cameras are used to check whether fishermen are following the rules.

According to a report by the Marine Management Organisation (MMO) which has been managing the trial, evidence suggests fishermen involved in the scheme are discarding less than 1 per cent of the cod and sole caught.

This compares to an average of more than a fifth (21 per cent) for North Sea cod and 9 per cent of sole in the Western Channel which is caught and then discarded because it exceeds the quotas set by Brussels.

The trial’s manager, Julian Roberts, from the MMO, said the experiment showed fishermen were being more selective about where they fished and were using better gear which targets bigger fish and avoids juvenile specimens.

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