Call for even tougher sanctions on Iceland and Faroes for over-fishing

Even tougher trade sanctions against Iceland and the Faroe Islands have been demanded by the European Parliament in retaliation for over-fishing of mackerel.

A report by MEP Pat the Cope Gallagher got the unanimous backing of the parliament’s fisheries committee that also asked the Donegal man to oversee the introduction of the measures. The trade sanctions would ban all fish products and some fishing gear from being imported into the EU and ban their vessels from EU ports.

There have been 11 separate rounds of negotiations with Iceland over their decision to ignore quotas they share with the EU and catch half of the fish available.

So far member states have not gone as far as threatening to break off Iceland’s negotiations to join the EU, but have said they will refuse to negotiate on the fisheries chapter.

Known as the Gallagher report, it goes further than the original proposal from the European Commission and the full parliament will vote on it in June, after which member states will make their final decision.

Mr Gallagher said: “I sincerely hope that these measures will never be used and I encourage all sides to immediately resume talks so as to resolve the dispute over mackerel in the north-east Atlantic.

“If a solution is not found, all sides will eventually lose out as history has shown that countries cannot continue to fish above the recommended quota without environmental consequences occurring, resulting in subsequent economic impacts for all.”

The issue is a particularly serious one for Ireland as mackerel is Ireland’s most valuable fish, worth around €100m a year.

Iceland normally got just 0.3% of the quota and the Faroes 4.8% of the fish that traditionally was in their waters for just a few months of the year. However with climate change, stocks have been moving north over recent years and for the past four years, both countries have been vastly exceeding their quota.