Post by SHARK on Apr 21, 2009 21:32:31 GMT 1
Looks like if this goes ahead it could mean better fishing for us all.
The following information was found on the defra website:
Nobel House
17 Smith Square
London SW1A 3JR
Telephone 08459 335577
Email jonathan.shaw@defra.gsi.gov.uk
Website www.defra.gov.uk
12th February 2008
From Jonathan Shaw MP
Minister for Marine, Landscape & Rural Affairs and Minister for the South East
Dear Sir / Madam,
You will be aware of the current difficulties within parts of the under 10m fleet where there is an imbalance in between the available quota and the capacity of vessels accessing it. This has arisen for a number of reasons. Whilst there are no easy answers to this situation, given the difficulties that this is causing some operators I propose to put in place a package of measures which I believe will provide some relief to inshore fishermen. The objective of these measures is to ensure that as many fishermen as possible can access quota in the pool viably and legally.
I held a meeting on Tuesday 5th February to discuss possible options with a range of inshore fishermen and representatives of Producer Organisations. I wanted to write to all licence holders to ensure that everybody is aware of what we discussed and the next steps I will be taking.
When the under 10m pool was originally set up, it provided fishing opportunities to small scale fishing operators who caught relatively low levels of quota species. In recent years pressure on the quota allocations for the under 10m fleet has increased for a number of reasons, including migration into the pool, an increase of capacity of some vessels accessing pool quota and a decrease in some key quota stocks. This has led to the use of monthly catch limits as a means of managing quota uptake by these vessels.
To spread fishing opportunity across the year to ensure as equitable access as possible to all those within the pool, the MFA is implementing a new catch limit system. A key element of the new system is the introduction of a quarterly review process which will bring together representatives of the under 10 metre fleet and the Producer Organisations through Regional Quota Management Advisory Groups, to ensure that the best is made of available quota. Producer Organisations have been helpful in the past in assisting with the availability of quota in the pool and I will be interested to see how they respond within this new framework.
Whilst my proposed approach should benefit the majority of inshore fishermen, that the catch limits proposed for this year, and those likely to be in place in future years (given the current ICES advice on stock status which means that quotas are unlikely to increase in the short term), will present difficulties for some businesses currently operating within the pool. The owners of vessels for which the catch limits pose a problem will need to think about whether they can continue to operate within the pool in the future. The primary purpose of the pool will remain as originally intended. It will be for vessels which do not catch large amounts of quota species.
Defra is considering making some limited support available through a package of measures to ease the transition. We propose to take action to:
• Enable some high catching vessels to exit from the pool;
• Prevent latent capacity within the under 10m fleet from becoming active;
• Support individuals to increase the returns from your business
Before making a decision about how we propose to do this, we would welcome your views. I have enclosed with this letter a short paper setting out in some detail our current proposals. In summary these include:
• A limited decommissioning scheme targeted at those that catch at or close to the catch limits;
• Capping effort within the pool to restrict the amount of quota species that vessels in the pool may catch in the future based on past recorded landings;
• Permitting under 10m vessels to lease quota for a limited time to enable them to continue to catch quota species at levels higher than the pool limits, whilst deciding future options;
• Ensuring that vessels have the appropriate licence cover for their engine power
• Support to help improve the performance and efficiency of businesses;
• A new fisheries science project which will give the inshore fleet direct involvement in the science that underpins management decisions.
I will make my decision about the next steps in the light of your views and move to implementation as soon as possible. In the meantime, if you are making any business decisions you will no doubt want to bear in mind the potential implications of the proposals I have outlined as well as the prospects of future access to quota.
Any action taken in relation to decommissioning and/or changes to licences will be based on what vessels have been catching recently - most probably between the introduction of the Buyers and Sellers Regulations and December 2007. If you plan to be involved in any licence transfer you should therefore be aware of what the vessel it was attached to caught during that period.
These proposed changes represent an interim, rather than a long-term, solution and we will continue to look at the reform of fisheries quota management more broadly.
There is no easy solution and I recognise that it is not possible to satisfy everybody. The options set out above have been proposed in the best interests of the fishing fleet as a whole. No final decision has been taken and I would welcome your views. Enclosed with this letter is a short paper setting out our proposed measures in more detail. Please send
your views to James Acord by 7th March. Your District Inspector will also be happy to discuss these options.
Yours sincerely,
JONATHAN SHAW
Tackling the Current Difficulties in the English Under 10m Fishing Sector
Outline of Options – Discussion Paper
The Issue
1. Parts of the Under 10m fleet in England are currently experiencing difficulties due to the imbalance between capacity and available quota in the pool. This imbalance has arisen due to a number of factors and become apparent now that quota uptake is more accurately monitored using data from the Registration of Buyers and Sellers Regulation (RBS). There are also particular difficulties in relation to the discrepancy between the level of quota and fish on the ground in relation to Channel cod. We will be working with France and the European Commission to review the Total Allowable Catch for this stock during 2008 once an ICES assessment of the most recent Channel stock surveys is available.
2. Defra/MFA are now implementing a new system to enable equitable access to different fisheries throughout the year to under 10m fishing vessels. This will result in more transparent and stable catch limits for most stocks. A number of businesses have, in the past, caught more than the new monthly catch limits, and therefore it will no longer be viable for them to operate at that level in the pool. The owners of these vessels will need to make a choice about their future. We envisage that there would be four principal choices for those in this situation:
• Leave the pool and join a PO
• Leave the fishing industry
• Adjust fishing operation to live within the new limits
• Diversify into fishing for less pressurised stocks.
3. Defra wishes to take action to ease the transition for these vessels and to assist those who remain in the pool. The proposals set out below cover the options that we are currently considering. Defra will be making a decision soon about its course of action but before then we would welcome your views about our proposals.
The context
4. Defra’s proposals to address the immediate difficulties in the Under 10m fleet need to be considered both in the context of developments which have affected the under 10 metre fleet and in relation to planned longer term reform of the quota management system and access to fisheries in general.
5. The “pool” quota management system for the under 10 metre fleet – under which these vessels fish against pools of quota managed by Defra and the other Fisheries Administrations – was introduced in the 1980s. Since then quota allocations have come under increasing pressure due to a range of factors. These include:
• Successive reductions in EU quotas for some key stocks (as much as 70% over 10 years in some cases);
• Increase of fishing effort within the under 10m fleet;
• The development of high-catching under 10 metre vessels (the “super under 10s”).
6. The new RBS-based data collection arrangements for these vessels, which were introduced in 2006, have made it clear that for some stocks there is now a significant mismatch between the level of catching and landing by the under 10
metre fleet and the quota available to them. There has also been uneven distribution of quota, for example 9% of vessels landed 70% of the available quota in the pool in 2007.
7. Defra’s proposed measures (set out in paragraphs 12 – 21 below) represent an interim solution in a broader programme of work that will build on the previous quota management change programme. This review will include consideration of the relative balance of fishing opportunity across all of the fleet in the context of making sure that our management systems will help us to deliver our desired outcomes of:
• Optimising economic efficiency from most of the resource;
• Delivering benefits to coastal communities.
Options for action
8. Defra has identified proposals through extensive analysis of the available data. There are no easy solutions and all options for action have both benefits and costs, as does a lack of action.
Defra’s objectives
9. Defra’s objective for its actions to address the current difficulties is to enable as many individuals as possible to operate viably and legally within the under 10m pool.
10. To achieve this we propose to take steps to deliver four key changes:
• Encouraging those who want to catch above the likely catch limits to leave the pool thereby releasing more quota for those who remain.
• Preventing latent capacity becoming active
• Maximising returns from fishing
• Collaborating more with Producer Organisations to top up quota within the pool
Question 1: Do you agree with Defra’s objective and the proposed steps to deliver it?
Proposal 1: Encouraging high catchers to leave the pool
11. To achieve this we are considering two principal measures, partly in response to requests from fishermen:
• A limited and targeted decommissioning scheme for those under 10m vessels that are high catchers.
• Permitting vessels within the Under 10m pool to lease quota for up to two years similar to the scheme that operated last year.
12. The purpose of these measures are to:
a. release some quota through decommissioning which may enable a small increase in catch limits for remaining vessels within the pool; and
b. give high catching vessels the opportunity to operate viably in the short term and therefore the time to make a decision about their future, for example, to invest in quota and become a member of a Producer Organisation.
13. There will be strict enforcement of the new catch limits. Over-fishing will not be tolerated.
Question 2: Do you think that these proposed measures will deliver their stated aims?
Question 3: How do you think that any decommissioning should be targeted in order to secure the maximum benefits for the fleet as a whole?
Question 4: Are there other actions that could be taken to help high catchers leave the pool and/or join a PO?
Proposal 2: Preventing latent capacity becoming active
14. There is a large number of under 10m fishing vessels which either do not fish or do not catch quota stocks up to the limits proposed by the MFA. There is a risk that such latent capacity could become active thereby reducing opportunities across the pool. The limits that are set by the MFA are based on the estimated landings of active vessels rather than all licensed under 10m vessels catching that level. It is likely that decommissioning of vessels will work best if those licences that are currently used by lower quota catching vessels do not start being used by vessels that land up to the new catch limits. To achieve this we are considering capping effort by restricting the proportion of the catch limits that some vessels can catch according to the track record of vessels since the introduction of the Registration of Buyers and Sellers Regulation. For example, this might mean that if a vessel had landed no quota species during the RBS period, their licence would be changed so that they would no longer be permitted to catch quota species, or would be restricted to a small bycatch amount.
15. We are also considering active checking to ensure that all vessels are appropriately licensed for the power of their vessel. This would further ensure that catching capacity is kept in line with available quota.
Question 5: Do you agree with the principle of capping effort through restrictive licensing?
Question 6: What issues should we take into account in designing the detail of any scheme if we go forward with this option?
Proposal 3: Maximising returns from fishing
16. The MFA has already appointed a project manager whose task it is to make sure that fishermen and their businesses can access the publicly available support open to them. There is a range of different opportunities and support for small businesses provided by specialist organisations and we want to help the fishing industry make the most of these opportunities.
17. The European Fisheries Fund will come on stream later this year and although we haven’t finalised the details of the scheme yet and will be consulting on that in April, the scheme should provide important opportunities for fishermen to adapt and develop their businesses.
Question 7: Are there other areas where action could be taken to help in maximise returns?
Proposal 4: Research project to improve evidence base for long term decision making
18. We propose to start a project to look at the environmental footprint of inshore fisheries. This will collect a range of information including that on fishing patterns, discards, fuel consumption and by-catch. This will give us an important evidence base upon which long term management decisions for the inshore fleet can be made. We propose that the pilot will initially take place in three areas of the N Sea, Hartlepool, Lowestoft and the Thames Estuary, and will allow participating fishermen to land all of what they catch (with the exception of undersize fish) to provide a fuller picture of the impact of fishing activity and the state of stocks.
19. This project reflects requests from the inshore industry to work more closely with scientists. We will be talking to fishermen about on the detail of the scheme and we hope to have the scheme up and running by the Summer.
Proposal 5: Working collaboratively with Producer Organisations
20. The MFA will be arranging quarterly meetings, involving representatives of both POs and inshore fishing interests, to review current quota uptake and explore the scope for assisting the under 10 metre fleet, for example by transferring surplus quota to these vessels. Meetings will be held on the coast, which in turn will provide input for a quarterly central meeting to advise on the level of the monthly catch limits and other issues.
Geographic scope of proposals
21. These proposals would apply to vessels registered in England and in British Fishery Limits adjacent to England only.
Next steps
22. Following your initial views on the principals of these proposals Defra will further develop proposals and run a short formal consultation about the detail of what the Department decides to take forward.
23. We aim to implement measures as soon as possible.
24. Please send any views you have on this paper by 7th March to:
James Acord,
Fishing Industry Management Division
Area 2C, Nobel House
17, Smith Square,
London,
SW1A 2HH
James.Acord@defra.gsi.gov.uk
The following information was found on the defra website:
Nobel House
17 Smith Square
London SW1A 3JR
Telephone 08459 335577
Email jonathan.shaw@defra.gsi.gov.uk
Website www.defra.gov.uk
12th February 2008
From Jonathan Shaw MP
Minister for Marine, Landscape & Rural Affairs and Minister for the South East
Dear Sir / Madam,
You will be aware of the current difficulties within parts of the under 10m fleet where there is an imbalance in between the available quota and the capacity of vessels accessing it. This has arisen for a number of reasons. Whilst there are no easy answers to this situation, given the difficulties that this is causing some operators I propose to put in place a package of measures which I believe will provide some relief to inshore fishermen. The objective of these measures is to ensure that as many fishermen as possible can access quota in the pool viably and legally.
I held a meeting on Tuesday 5th February to discuss possible options with a range of inshore fishermen and representatives of Producer Organisations. I wanted to write to all licence holders to ensure that everybody is aware of what we discussed and the next steps I will be taking.
When the under 10m pool was originally set up, it provided fishing opportunities to small scale fishing operators who caught relatively low levels of quota species. In recent years pressure on the quota allocations for the under 10m fleet has increased for a number of reasons, including migration into the pool, an increase of capacity of some vessels accessing pool quota and a decrease in some key quota stocks. This has led to the use of monthly catch limits as a means of managing quota uptake by these vessels.
To spread fishing opportunity across the year to ensure as equitable access as possible to all those within the pool, the MFA is implementing a new catch limit system. A key element of the new system is the introduction of a quarterly review process which will bring together representatives of the under 10 metre fleet and the Producer Organisations through Regional Quota Management Advisory Groups, to ensure that the best is made of available quota. Producer Organisations have been helpful in the past in assisting with the availability of quota in the pool and I will be interested to see how they respond within this new framework.
Whilst my proposed approach should benefit the majority of inshore fishermen, that the catch limits proposed for this year, and those likely to be in place in future years (given the current ICES advice on stock status which means that quotas are unlikely to increase in the short term), will present difficulties for some businesses currently operating within the pool. The owners of vessels for which the catch limits pose a problem will need to think about whether they can continue to operate within the pool in the future. The primary purpose of the pool will remain as originally intended. It will be for vessels which do not catch large amounts of quota species.
Defra is considering making some limited support available through a package of measures to ease the transition. We propose to take action to:
• Enable some high catching vessels to exit from the pool;
• Prevent latent capacity within the under 10m fleet from becoming active;
• Support individuals to increase the returns from your business
Before making a decision about how we propose to do this, we would welcome your views. I have enclosed with this letter a short paper setting out in some detail our current proposals. In summary these include:
• A limited decommissioning scheme targeted at those that catch at or close to the catch limits;
• Capping effort within the pool to restrict the amount of quota species that vessels in the pool may catch in the future based on past recorded landings;
• Permitting under 10m vessels to lease quota for a limited time to enable them to continue to catch quota species at levels higher than the pool limits, whilst deciding future options;
• Ensuring that vessels have the appropriate licence cover for their engine power
• Support to help improve the performance and efficiency of businesses;
• A new fisheries science project which will give the inshore fleet direct involvement in the science that underpins management decisions.
I will make my decision about the next steps in the light of your views and move to implementation as soon as possible. In the meantime, if you are making any business decisions you will no doubt want to bear in mind the potential implications of the proposals I have outlined as well as the prospects of future access to quota.
Any action taken in relation to decommissioning and/or changes to licences will be based on what vessels have been catching recently - most probably between the introduction of the Buyers and Sellers Regulations and December 2007. If you plan to be involved in any licence transfer you should therefore be aware of what the vessel it was attached to caught during that period.
These proposed changes represent an interim, rather than a long-term, solution and we will continue to look at the reform of fisheries quota management more broadly.
There is no easy solution and I recognise that it is not possible to satisfy everybody. The options set out above have been proposed in the best interests of the fishing fleet as a whole. No final decision has been taken and I would welcome your views. Enclosed with this letter is a short paper setting out our proposed measures in more detail. Please send
your views to James Acord by 7th March. Your District Inspector will also be happy to discuss these options.
Yours sincerely,
JONATHAN SHAW
Tackling the Current Difficulties in the English Under 10m Fishing Sector
Outline of Options – Discussion Paper
The Issue
1. Parts of the Under 10m fleet in England are currently experiencing difficulties due to the imbalance between capacity and available quota in the pool. This imbalance has arisen due to a number of factors and become apparent now that quota uptake is more accurately monitored using data from the Registration of Buyers and Sellers Regulation (RBS). There are also particular difficulties in relation to the discrepancy between the level of quota and fish on the ground in relation to Channel cod. We will be working with France and the European Commission to review the Total Allowable Catch for this stock during 2008 once an ICES assessment of the most recent Channel stock surveys is available.
2. Defra/MFA are now implementing a new system to enable equitable access to different fisheries throughout the year to under 10m fishing vessels. This will result in more transparent and stable catch limits for most stocks. A number of businesses have, in the past, caught more than the new monthly catch limits, and therefore it will no longer be viable for them to operate at that level in the pool. The owners of these vessels will need to make a choice about their future. We envisage that there would be four principal choices for those in this situation:
• Leave the pool and join a PO
• Leave the fishing industry
• Adjust fishing operation to live within the new limits
• Diversify into fishing for less pressurised stocks.
3. Defra wishes to take action to ease the transition for these vessels and to assist those who remain in the pool. The proposals set out below cover the options that we are currently considering. Defra will be making a decision soon about its course of action but before then we would welcome your views about our proposals.
The context
4. Defra’s proposals to address the immediate difficulties in the Under 10m fleet need to be considered both in the context of developments which have affected the under 10 metre fleet and in relation to planned longer term reform of the quota management system and access to fisheries in general.
5. The “pool” quota management system for the under 10 metre fleet – under which these vessels fish against pools of quota managed by Defra and the other Fisheries Administrations – was introduced in the 1980s. Since then quota allocations have come under increasing pressure due to a range of factors. These include:
• Successive reductions in EU quotas for some key stocks (as much as 70% over 10 years in some cases);
• Increase of fishing effort within the under 10m fleet;
• The development of high-catching under 10 metre vessels (the “super under 10s”).
6. The new RBS-based data collection arrangements for these vessels, which were introduced in 2006, have made it clear that for some stocks there is now a significant mismatch between the level of catching and landing by the under 10
metre fleet and the quota available to them. There has also been uneven distribution of quota, for example 9% of vessels landed 70% of the available quota in the pool in 2007.
7. Defra’s proposed measures (set out in paragraphs 12 – 21 below) represent an interim solution in a broader programme of work that will build on the previous quota management change programme. This review will include consideration of the relative balance of fishing opportunity across all of the fleet in the context of making sure that our management systems will help us to deliver our desired outcomes of:
• Optimising economic efficiency from most of the resource;
• Delivering benefits to coastal communities.
Options for action
8. Defra has identified proposals through extensive analysis of the available data. There are no easy solutions and all options for action have both benefits and costs, as does a lack of action.
Defra’s objectives
9. Defra’s objective for its actions to address the current difficulties is to enable as many individuals as possible to operate viably and legally within the under 10m pool.
10. To achieve this we propose to take steps to deliver four key changes:
• Encouraging those who want to catch above the likely catch limits to leave the pool thereby releasing more quota for those who remain.
• Preventing latent capacity becoming active
• Maximising returns from fishing
• Collaborating more with Producer Organisations to top up quota within the pool
Question 1: Do you agree with Defra’s objective and the proposed steps to deliver it?
Proposal 1: Encouraging high catchers to leave the pool
11. To achieve this we are considering two principal measures, partly in response to requests from fishermen:
• A limited and targeted decommissioning scheme for those under 10m vessels that are high catchers.
• Permitting vessels within the Under 10m pool to lease quota for up to two years similar to the scheme that operated last year.
12. The purpose of these measures are to:
a. release some quota through decommissioning which may enable a small increase in catch limits for remaining vessels within the pool; and
b. give high catching vessels the opportunity to operate viably in the short term and therefore the time to make a decision about their future, for example, to invest in quota and become a member of a Producer Organisation.
13. There will be strict enforcement of the new catch limits. Over-fishing will not be tolerated.
Question 2: Do you think that these proposed measures will deliver their stated aims?
Question 3: How do you think that any decommissioning should be targeted in order to secure the maximum benefits for the fleet as a whole?
Question 4: Are there other actions that could be taken to help high catchers leave the pool and/or join a PO?
Proposal 2: Preventing latent capacity becoming active
14. There is a large number of under 10m fishing vessels which either do not fish or do not catch quota stocks up to the limits proposed by the MFA. There is a risk that such latent capacity could become active thereby reducing opportunities across the pool. The limits that are set by the MFA are based on the estimated landings of active vessels rather than all licensed under 10m vessels catching that level. It is likely that decommissioning of vessels will work best if those licences that are currently used by lower quota catching vessels do not start being used by vessels that land up to the new catch limits. To achieve this we are considering capping effort by restricting the proportion of the catch limits that some vessels can catch according to the track record of vessels since the introduction of the Registration of Buyers and Sellers Regulation. For example, this might mean that if a vessel had landed no quota species during the RBS period, their licence would be changed so that they would no longer be permitted to catch quota species, or would be restricted to a small bycatch amount.
15. We are also considering active checking to ensure that all vessels are appropriately licensed for the power of their vessel. This would further ensure that catching capacity is kept in line with available quota.
Question 5: Do you agree with the principle of capping effort through restrictive licensing?
Question 6: What issues should we take into account in designing the detail of any scheme if we go forward with this option?
Proposal 3: Maximising returns from fishing
16. The MFA has already appointed a project manager whose task it is to make sure that fishermen and their businesses can access the publicly available support open to them. There is a range of different opportunities and support for small businesses provided by specialist organisations and we want to help the fishing industry make the most of these opportunities.
17. The European Fisheries Fund will come on stream later this year and although we haven’t finalised the details of the scheme yet and will be consulting on that in April, the scheme should provide important opportunities for fishermen to adapt and develop their businesses.
Question 7: Are there other areas where action could be taken to help in maximise returns?
Proposal 4: Research project to improve evidence base for long term decision making
18. We propose to start a project to look at the environmental footprint of inshore fisheries. This will collect a range of information including that on fishing patterns, discards, fuel consumption and by-catch. This will give us an important evidence base upon which long term management decisions for the inshore fleet can be made. We propose that the pilot will initially take place in three areas of the N Sea, Hartlepool, Lowestoft and the Thames Estuary, and will allow participating fishermen to land all of what they catch (with the exception of undersize fish) to provide a fuller picture of the impact of fishing activity and the state of stocks.
19. This project reflects requests from the inshore industry to work more closely with scientists. We will be talking to fishermen about on the detail of the scheme and we hope to have the scheme up and running by the Summer.
Proposal 5: Working collaboratively with Producer Organisations
20. The MFA will be arranging quarterly meetings, involving representatives of both POs and inshore fishing interests, to review current quota uptake and explore the scope for assisting the under 10 metre fleet, for example by transferring surplus quota to these vessels. Meetings will be held on the coast, which in turn will provide input for a quarterly central meeting to advise on the level of the monthly catch limits and other issues.
Geographic scope of proposals
21. These proposals would apply to vessels registered in England and in British Fishery Limits adjacent to England only.
Next steps
22. Following your initial views on the principals of these proposals Defra will further develop proposals and run a short formal consultation about the detail of what the Department decides to take forward.
23. We aim to implement measures as soon as possible.
24. Please send any views you have on this paper by 7th March to:
James Acord,
Fishing Industry Management Division
Area 2C, Nobel House
17, Smith Square,
London,
SW1A 2HH
James.Acord@defra.gsi.gov.uk