EU Fisheries and Oceans Commissioner Costas Kadis has said that last week's fisheries deal between Europe and Britain could have been so much worse.
Speaking to RTÉ Radio 1 Seascapes in Castletownbere, West Cork on Friday, Commissioner Kadis said the agreement at last week’s EU-UK summit to extend the post-Brexit fishing deal to 2038 gives “stability and predictability for many years”.
Irish seafood industry representatives have described the deal, now extended for 12 years, as a “disaster” as 40% of the value of quotas transferred by the EU to Britain after Brexit comes from Ireland alone.
“We will not have this annual concern about what the situation [ with Britain] will be every year,” Commissioner Kadis explained, speaking to Seascapes before meeting Irish seafood industry representatives in Ireland’s top whitefish port.
“We have secured access without compensation… We have to build on this,” he said, pledging to “take into consideration in the framework of the evaluation of Common Fisheries Policy the concerns of the Irish sector.”
“That’s why I am here today,” he told the programme. He had been invited to Castletownbere during his visit to Cork for European Maritime Day 2025. He was accompanied to the top whitefish port by Minister of State for Fisheries and Environment Timmy Dooley.
Seascapes episode three carries a reaction by seafood leader Aodh O Donnell to that Castletownbere meeting.
It also has an interview with Marine Institute chief executive Dr Rick Officer on board the State’s research ship RV Tom Crean, which is in Cork this weekend for European Maritime Day’s two-day “seafest”.
Seamus Hayes, director of photography for the RTÉ television series on the fishing industry, Tarrac na Farraige, speaks about how he fished with his late father when growing up.
Seamus Hayes, director of photography for the television series, Tarrac na Farraige, on the fishing industry.
In the "favourite marine books" section, poet Alanna Offield, who is owner of the online and travelling bookshop, Seaside Books, speaks to Jan Ní Fhlanagáin about her enthusiasm for Sinead Gleeson’s first novel, Hagstone (4th Estate, 2024)
Programme 3 of Seascapes was broadcast on Friday night, May 23rd, as part of six-week return of the radio programme. It is presented by Lorna Siggins and produced by Ronan Kelly.
Listen back here
Seascapes 2025 - Programme 1
Programme 1 of the 2025 season of Seascapes, broadcast on May 9th, included a snapshot of views on offshore wind plans for the Irish Sea recorded at a recent public meeting in Dun Laoghaire, Co Dublin.
Windsurfer Katie McAnena off the Sligo coast
It also included an interview with windsurfer and Sligo-based GP Dr Katie McAnena, who was one of the first women in the world to windsurf the fearsome wave sequence off Hawaii known as “Jaws”.
You can listen back to Seascapes programme 1 May 9th 2025 here
Seascapes 2025 - Programme 2
Programme 2 of Seascapes broadcast on May 16th returned to Rossport in north Mayo to hear the views of three of the Rossport Five and others 20 years after their jailing over their opposition to the pipeline route for the gas project.
Erris inshore fisherman Eamon Dixon, recalling the Corrib gas project.
It also included an interview by Jan Ní Fhlanagáin with scientist and surfer Easkey Britton about her favourite marine book – Rachel Carson’s classic The Sea Around Us.
You can listen back to Seascapes programme 2 May 16th, 2025 here
