Spain’s Secretary General for Fisheries Isabel Artime has held meetings with autonomous communities and the representatives of the Mediterranean fishing sector to discuss measures to be adopted relating to demersal fishing measures that come under the decisions of the Council of Ministers held in December.
While Spain, France and Italy had lobbied hard for fishing effort reduction mechanisms under the multiannual plan for demersal fishing in the western Mediterranean to be frozen at their then-level, the Council had other ideas and adopted drastic days at sea reductions for the trawl fleet, that can be offset against technical measures to claw back additional days at sea.
Selectivity measures introduced include the use of a 45-millimetre codends in coastal fisheries and a 50-millimetre codends in deep-sea fisheries in order to maintain the same number of fishing days in 2025 as the previous year.
Spain’s Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food will finance the acquisition of two new codends per vessel (45mm or 50mm) for the entire Mediterranean fleet, or four codends for vessels carrying out mixed fishing, two of each type. This financing will be carried out under de minimis or state aid.
The General Secretariat of Fisheries will certify, at the request of each vessel, the gear that at the time of inspection complies with the minimum dimensions of 45 millimetres or 50 millimetres, with a validity of twelve months.
