The Irish Wildlife Trust (IWT) has called on the Government to submit its “overdue” national roadmap for phasing out destructive fishing in Marine Protected Areas (MPAs).
A new study released by Seas at Risk, Oceana and ClientEarth - three environmental NGOs working on marine conservation issues - shows that no EU member state has submitted plans to phase out bottom trawling in MPAs.
This is “despite EU nature laws and international biodiversity commitments which bind member states to protect their MPAs”, they state.
A total of nine member states have submitted “roadmaps” to this end, but Ireland is not one of the nine, the IWT says.
“It is one year since the deadline lapsed for countries to submit their roadmaps outlining how they plan to phase out bottom trawling in MPAs through the EU Marine Action Plan,”it says.
“The analysis shows that some countries have measures in place in some MPAs but many are still threatened by bottom trawling,”it says.
“This could be a possible breach of EU laws and several NGOs from France, Germany, the Netherlands, Spain and Sweden have filed lawsuits against national governments for their failure to protect their MPAs from destructive fishing,”the IWT says.
“The analysis looked at Bulgaria, Cyprus, Germany, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Romania, Slovenia and Spain as these are the only countries who have submitted their plans, while Estonia refused to disclose theirs,”the IWT says.
“National measures in place in Natura 2000 MPAs designated to protect the seabed and marine species were examined in the study,”it says.
“None of the roadmaps provided a plan to phase out bottom trawling in MPAs by 2030 and only one country (Germany) has reported a fisheries joint recommendation,”it says.
“Joint recommendations are when more than one country which has fishing interests in an area put in a recommendation for protective measures through the Common Fisheries Policy. The plans were not strong on details on what national measures will be adopted,”it says.
Oceana, Seas at Risk and ClientEarth are making an urgent call for the European Commission to carry out the necessary follow-up on the Marine Action Plan, including:
- initiating legal action for failing to respect EU nature laws;
- closing MPAs to bottom trawling under the Common Fisheries Policy (in the absence of necessary regional fisheries measures - known as joint recommendations); and
- putting forward new legislation via the Ocean Pact to ensure that marine areas are truly protected from destructive activities like bottom trawling.
“The IWT adds its support to the EU level calls to action and is also calling on the Irish government to submit their national roadmap,”it says.
“ We contacted ministers responsible for this in the previous government several times on this issue,”it says.
“The roadmaps must include detailed plans on how they plan to phase out this destructive practice, including the compensation methods which will be necessary for small scale fishers still using this method,”it says.
“The Government must effectively manage its inshore fish populations and give fishers the options and tools they need to enable a just transition,”it says.
“Many habitats are in bad ecological condition in Ireland and there are new restoration thresholds in place through the Nature Restoration Law which will require stricter management of MPAs,” it says,
Grace Carr, Marine Advocacy Officer with The Irish Wildlife Trust said that it is “really disappointing that the Irish government has not submitted their roadmap or detailed any actions in how they plan to effectively protect their seabed MPAs and phase out destructive fishing”.
“It shows a great deal of apathy and a lack of ambition to truly protect and restore Irish waters. We hope to see ambitious measures included within the upcoming National Restoration Plans, including plans to initiate Joint Recommendations in order to effectively restore degraded marine ecosystems,”she said.
