According to critics strict quotas on the Icelandic fishing industry result in unnecessary waste and distort data. The Icelandic commercial fishing industry adheres to quotas set by the Fisheries Ministry that allow individual boats to fish a fixed amount of a species of fish per day.
The main aim of the quotas is to support sustainable fishing. But critics say that the quotas are detrimental to the industry as a whole, resulting in miscalculated data and excessive waste. Sigmar Thor Ingason, a fisherman familiar with the Icelandic system, said that although boats are allocated quotas for a particular type of fish, the waters they fish in often contain a variety of fish species that inevitably get caught in the nets and hauled aboard.
Gretar Mar Jonsson, who has been fishing Icelandic waters for more than 30 years, blames the quota system for encouraging this waste by bypassing the landing process, whereby fish caught at sea are processed and then sold without being weighed and recorded.
