An agreement on the management, and reciprocal access to mackerel in each other’s waters has been reached by Norway, the Faroe Islands and the UK.
‘Britain and the Faroe Islands are important partners for us. I am therefore very satisfied that we have agreed on a multi-year agreement on the management and distribution of mackerel, where together we contribute to reducing the total fishing pressure on the stock,’ said Norway’s Minister of Fisheries and Oceans Marianne Sivertsen Næss.
The tripartite agreement covers national quotas, access and scientific co-operation, and applies, until further notice, for three years.
Under the agreement, the Faroe Islands get 98,708 tonnes of mackerel, equivalent to 13.35% of the internationally agreed 739,386-tonne TAC. The agreement gives Norway a 31% share, 229,210 tonnes, while the UK gets 27.48%, or 203,211 tonnes.
Under this arrangement, these three nations have allocated themselves almost 72% of the mackerel TAC for the North-East Atlantic, leaving the remaining roughly quarter of the TAC to the European Union, Iceland and Greenland. In recent years and with no agreement on division of the TAC between all of the concerned coastal states, the fishery has invariably exceeded the agreed TAC – and this year looks to be no exception.
According to the Norwegian authorities, the agreement is designed so that it is possible to include the remaining coastal states if they so wish.
‘I hope that this agreement can inspire the other parties to join a comprehensive coastal state agreement at a later date,’ Marianne Sivertsen Næss said.
