In 2006, the marine research and conservation organization, Oceana, undertook a campaign against the use with driftnets in the Mediterranean. Investigators documented swordfish fisheries carried out by Moroccan vessels with driftnets in waters of the Alboran Sea, and the presence of this destructive fishing gear in Moroccan ports. Xavier Pastor, Executive Director of Oceana in … Read more
Last year, on the initiative of Fisheries Commissioner Joe Borg, the European Commission presented a proposal to introduce a full definition of a driftnet. A number of driftnet fleets, including the French thonaillers have exploited the lack of a definition to flout the EU driftnet ban and continue using their illegal gear. This new definition … Read more
Oceana is sceptical about this and demands effective control measures to ensure compliance with international agreements. The last step was taken in the approval of the fishing agreement between the European Union and the Kingdom of Morocco on February 27, in Rabat. This agreement destines €161 million to Morocco as economic compensation in exchange for … Read more
Oceana congratulates the Euro MPs for approving this definition and hopes for the quick approval by the European Union Council of Fisheries Ministers. Driftnets constitute an indiscriminate fishing method, banned by the General Assembly of the United Nations, by the European Union in 2002 and by the General Fisheries Commission for the Mediterranean (GFCM) in … Read more
The discarded fish constitute 8% of the total weight of the world’s captures, or more than 7.3 million tons of fish that are thrown away at sea. Oceana affirms that this practice is most troubling in the European Union’s Atlantic fisheries. One out of every 6 kilos of fish captured in Europe never reaches the … Read more
The Director of Oceana in Europe, Xavier Pastor, has written a letter to the Italian Government’s Fisheries Minister, Mr. Paolo de Castro, in which he describes the preliminary results of the report that Oceana is preparing dealing with the Italian fleet’s use of illegal driftnets. This report, which will be sent to the European Union … Read more
During the Oceana Ranger’s recent expedition in the Tyrrhenian Sea, the crew on board the environmental organisation’s catamaran witnessed an interaction between illegal driftnetters and large purse-seiners congregating around the tuna fattening cages to the north of the Aeolian Islands in Sicily. This situation could well be taking place at other tuna-fattening farms. Once the … Read more
The Italian Legislative Department has recently backed the new “zero tolerance” policy recently announced by Paolo de Castro, the Italian Minister of Agriculture and Fishing, declaring it illegal for vessels to carry driftnets, known as “spadare” on board. These nets have been prohibited by the EU since 2002. This decision precedes the publication of a … Read more
Despite the fact that driftnets have been banned in the Mediterranean for many years, a fleet of Moroccan fishing vessels continues to use this destructive fishing gear in the Alboran Sea and the Straits of Gibraltar, setting nets up to 12 kilometres long. Oceana, the marine conservation organisation, estimates that this fleet is made up … Read more
The annual meeting of the International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tunas (ICCAT) which ended last night, brought agreement to examine the status of Atlantic sharks, but no measures to protect these vulnerable species from overfishing. The lack of action by ICCAT leaves conservationists looking to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species … Read more
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