According to MEPs fishery products should be classified as ‘sensitive’ in global fish trade talks. They adopted a resolution which says that the EU’s fishing and aquaculture industries must not be exposed to unfair competition from imports. MEPs believe that fisheries and aquaculture do not lend themselves to a purely free-trade approach.
There should be reasonable, adjustable tariff protection, a tool to regulate imports, while products from third countries should meet the same standards as European-produced fish. However, MEPs strongly insist that the future EU import arrangements must not affect the overall goal of the upcoming fisheries reform: to preserve viable fishery and aquaculture sectors. This resolution is said to influence the upcoming reform of the common fisheries policy.
MEPs have called for customs protection, which is adjustable, should continue to be a legitimate instrument to regulate imports, argues the resolution. Moreover, it is tariff protection that gives meaning to the preferences granted to developing countries. Parliament believes that responsibility for leading the EU’s trade talks on fishery and aquaculture products should be transferred from the Trade Commissioner to the Commissioner for Maritime Affairs and Fisheries.
MEPs insist that imports meet the same standards as EU production in every respect: environmental, labour, health and quality. There was strong call for an urgent revision of the outdated common market organisation in fishery products, so that it contributes to guaranteeing earnings in the sector, ensuring market stability and increasing the added value of European products.
