Changes from report parliamentary committee draft to plenary report

In 2009 the Commission published a Green Paper, with a vision of how the Common Fisheries Policy (CFP) should look like in the future. This opened the debate for a reform, which was adopted in 2013.

The current Commission is due to present a report to the European Parliament and to the Council on the functioning of the CFP by 31 December 2022. It should evaluate the Common Fisheries Policy by 2022 to identify how to address issues not sufficiently covered in the current policy, such as the social dimension, climate adaptation and clean oceans, and reflect on its future development.

This draft report has the ambition to provide for political guidance on any future review of the CFP. If it does not provide all the answers, it poses some questions on the implementation of the current CFP, on whether the current CFP objectives and tools are still relevant to tackle current and future challenges and on whether certain aspects should be reformed, reviewed, adapted or improved.

The Commission has always had a healthy critical view of the policy, and this has been the main engine for policy change. The Commission should continue promoting policy improvement when and where necessary.

Due to the constraints with regard to the length of the report, it was not possible to deal with every single aspect of the CFP covered under the CFP basic regulation (EU) 1380/2013. A choice had to be made.

The report therefore primarily focuses on fish stock conservation and fisheries management, building also upon specific reports already adopted in the few past years on issues such as Maximum Sustainable Yield, the landing obligation, the implementation of article17 of the CFP or “Fishers for the future”. Technical measures are however not developed in consideration of its rather recent new legislative framework.

The report does not cover aquaculture (which has just been the subject of a specific resolution by the European Parliament) nor marketing and processing of fisheries and aquaculture products (under the framework of a specific regulation adopted in parallel the Basic regulation). It does not address either other key dimensions, such as the structural pillar of the CFP (under the FEAMP regulation), control (currently under inter-institutional negotiations) or the effects of Brexit on EU fisheries in the North-East Atlantic (also dealt with in a recent resolution).

Position of the rapporteur

Without entering in specific measures that need to be reviewed, the future CFP needs a paradigm shift from rigid and unrealistic targets to pragmatic and achievable objectives.

In the course of the last decade (2010-2020) we have observed a radical change from a complete lack of clearly defined objectives for fisheries management to rigid “political” targets set hastily in 2013 (year of the last CFP reform), conscious that nobody had at that time all the answers to the questions about their effects and practical implementation and letting the experience test their ability to bring results or not. The trouble is that still today, not only the targets agreed back in 2013 are not attained within the deadlines set, but we discover that some are impossible to attain and others are extremely difficult to put in practice.

Scientists recognise that having all fish stocks in a marine ecosystem exploited at Maximum Sustainable Yield (MSY), which we have set as a target by 2020, is practically impossible. All stocks, especially in a fishery where various species are caught, cannot be fished at MSY levels simultaneously. Also the target to implement the obligation to land all catches by 2019, while it sounds simple as a concept, still creates huge difficulties today. The MSY concept should be implemented in light of the practical reality and in consideration of the socio-economic, proportionality and food security dimensions.

The result is mistrust by fishers vis-a-vis to politicians, because measures adopted are unfit and lack solid scientific basis, mistrust by the society, which considers that the EU has failed to deliver what had been agreed, but also indignation vis-a-vis to fishers because they are seen as non-complying with the law.

The EU credibility is put into question. There is a need for realistic and achievable objectives. Fishers need to be taken on board. In the future CFP, the image of the noble and difficult metier of fishers – especially of EU fishers – providing consumers with healthy, high quality and sustainable food, needs to be re-established and promoted.

The current CFP targets are too much focused on environmental considerations. While nobody doubts that healthy fishing stocks and the protection of biodiversity is a conditio sine qua non for an economically viable fishing sector, one should not lose sight of the fact that the objective of the CFP is not simply to have more abundant fishery resources, or fewer overexploited ones, but also – or primarily – to achieve maximum sustainable levels of production of seafood, in order to ensure food security and positive social and economic returns to fishers and coastal communities. Therefore, fisheries and environmental policy must be aligned, but environmental objectives cannot prevail over those of the CFP.

Good governance, early consultation and effective involvement of stakeholders in the decision-making progress, are basic ingredients for a successful policy.

In this context, ensuring a level playing field with certain foreign fleets with low social and environmental standards that fish at the same zones with EU operators and commercialising their products at the EU market is fundamental for the competitiveness of the EU fleets and aquaculture producers.

In parallel, we must ensure that the EU defends the interests of its fishing sectors at global level in the context of its action on oceans’ governance. Defending and promoting the EU sustainability model is perfectly compatible and should go hand in hand with the defence of the EU sectors’ interests.

The EU fisheries and aquaculture sectors and the whole seafood value chain are strategic actors, for their societal role of providing high quality healthy food to consumers. We need to give them the place they deserve and put them more generally high in the EU political agenda.

Finally, outermost regions have specific constraints and specific needs as provided for in article 349 TFEU. The CFP ought to take account of their specific characteristics and needs and adapt to these.