The project is budding from the EU Baltic Sea Strategy and was launched as a pet project by Sweden for its EU Presidency in the autumn of 2009. The Strategy, launched by the Commission and the upcoming Swedish Presidency in June and adopted by the Council in October 2009. Spread over those 15 priority areas were some 80 “Flagship projects”, with “Ensure sustainable fishing” as the sole fisheries project in the original version.
Develop and improve coordination and cooperation among Member States and stakeholders was added in the newly form Baltfish project. Eradicating discards and Encourage sustainable aquaculture production methods, were later added, with Sweden, Denmark and Finland, respectively, as coordinating nations.
Baltfish, with the general aim that the eight “Baltic” states would appear at future Council meetings with commonly, if not formally, agreed positions, is planned to work on two levels – High Level Group (HLG) and Forum Seminars. HLG meetings, open only to the member state administrations and the Baltic Sea director of the EU Commission, will be arranged on a regular and seemingly frequent basis.
Experts said that Baltfish will offer an opportunity to seek common goals and strategies and make suggestions and common actions in relevant fora”. The atmosphere during HLG-meetings should aim to be less formal. The chairmanship, responsible for coordination, will run over twelve months, starting with Sweden until 1 July next year, when Finland takes over.
Iona Jepsena, head of the Baltic and North Sea units in the EU Commission, also presented a draft proposal for how to approach the discard problem in Baltic Sea fisheries. The Council and the Commission decided a year ago to develop a roadmap and to set up Terms of Reference for a technical working group to assess and recommend additional measures to eradicate discards in the Baltic Sea.
