In order to end the practice of throwing back thousands of tonnes of fish every year scientists have comes up with an idea of ‘spy in the boat’ technology in which CCTV cameras place on the boat to monitor every move. In return fisherman would be given bigger quotas, but the numbers of fish taken would fall with the end of high rates of dead fish discarded at sea.
In a Danish trial project six boats are taking part which could become a blueprint for the EU, which has said that its Common Fisheries Policy should be ripped up and redrafted because stocks of cod and other large fish remain severely depleted. It is reported that 24,400 tonnes of cod were landed in the North Sea in 2007, whereas 23,600 tonnes were thrown back dead and another 14,600 tonnes were unaccounted for as fishermen strove to keep within strict catch quotas, according to the International Council for the Exploration of the Sea. It is told that under the plan announced today by the Danish Government, fishermen who volunteer to have CCTV installed on their boats would be given catch quotas rather than landing quotas, meaning that every fish caught will be counted rather than every fish brought back to shore.
Eva Kjer Hansen, Denmark’s Fisheries Minster, said that the present policy is a very complex system with lots of micro regulations that fishermen do not like. She told that there is a need of big reform to move from landing quotas to catch quotas so that everything caught is landed. Aaron McLoughlin, head of the European Marine Programme at WWF, said that moving from the discredited regime that sets quotas on what fishermen land, to that of setting the quota on what fishermen actually catch is common sense.
