At the request of the European Commission, ICES has just issued its opinion on catch opportunities for European eel in 2025.
This advice is dated 1 November 2024, and obviously given the terms of reference defined by the Commission: to look only at the fishing aspect and the catch opportunities for 2025, it is similar to the advice given by the group of experts since 2022: 0 catches.
https://anguilleresponsable.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/11/ele.2737.nea2025.pdf
The point here is not to criticise the experts, who delivered their verdict according to the terms of reference communicated by the Fisheries Commission, but the terms of the annual order.
These terms of reference are clear and reductive: to define the impact of fishing on the resource and the catch possibilities for next year, when it has been said in previous years that the necessary elements were not available to assess the population in the fisheries sense of the term.
As the document indicates, since 2022 and following the request from ICES (Biseau and Diaz report of February 2021) to bring the wording of the advice into line with the classic form of advice, the precautionary approach has been advocated insofar as the elements needed to assess this population were lacking and in view of a downward trend in a relative indicator of glass eel recruitment.
In fact, there is nothing new, and the advice for the coming years with such terms of reference will be the same: no catches!
However, the definition of these terms of reference: focusing solely on the effects of fishing is not in line with the vision of the European Parliament, which had called for a more global approach, as carried out by this working group from 2007 to 2021: ‘All impacts linked to anthropogenic factors should be reduced as far as possible’.
In addition, management plans were to be evaluated, but this was not part of the European Commission’s mandate. The conclusion of the Van-Ruyssen report, approved by the European Parliament, called for a more global vision, with an assessment of all the uses that affect this resource – and there are many – and a clear analysis by all the stakeholders of the eel management plans implemented by the Member States.
Instead, we have yet another report that adds nothing, except for certain NGOs who only want one thing: to see the disappearance of many ecosystems of this small-scale continental, estuarine and coastal fishing. In so doing, they are playing into the hands of those who are devastating our environments, as demonstrated by the latest report from the European Environment Agency, whose verdict is clear: only 37% of surface waters are in good or very good ecological state !
AFPMAR protests against these partisan positions, which only take a few elements out of context. We are also protesting against the European Commission’s order to ICES, which is totally at odds with the considerations of the Van-Ruyssen report, which were validated by our MEPs in full knowledge of the facts.
Experience shows that for all diadromous species, simply regulating fishing without improving the quality of ecosystems and ecological continuity achieves nothing: salmon, sea trout, shad and eel are clear examples.