The Managing Director of one of the biggest fishermen’s co-operatives in the country has criticised French fishermen who have tried to impose a boycott on the sales of imported fish. The Scottish fishing industry has also made complaints.
“They like to declare European waters when they have 50 per cent of the monkfish quota in Irish waters, while Ireland gets just 5 per cent of the monkfish quota in our own waters,” says John Nolan, Managing Director of Castletownbere Fishermen’s Co-op. “But they don’t like to accept that there is a European market to which we have equal access.”
"Ireland gets just 5 per cent of the monkfish quota in our own waters"
THE ECHO Cork reports that he says French fishermen “have been taking television crews to wholesale and processing operations which they accused of buying fish from non/French boats and not supporting their own industry. People are afraid actually in France to take fish off us. Even big supermarkets like Leclerc, even their government is saying only buy French fish. It does get annoying when you see the way the French are acting. You get this parochialism coming in and the French fishermen going around, they don’t want a European market, but they do want our waters to be European for them. I’m disappointed with that attitude.”
More on THE ECHO which, in a leading article today headed: “Island nation - let us benefit,” also calls for the new government to give Ireland’s “marine and fisheries industries the recognition and attention they deserve.”
“A government review of policy leading to more support of the industries should be an early initiative if their statement about seeing Ireland as an island nation is to meany anything,” the paper says.
