Goodfish
'Supporting sustainable inshore day fisheries to help conserve the coastal environment, plus more!'
How could we get better fishing rules for Sussex?
The Sussex Sea Fisheries Committee has the powers to create byelaws (dredging is banned out to three miles), so the voice of local people, conservation organisations and fishermen need to be targeted at them - read on!
The Marine Bill currently going through Parliament will include Marine Conservation Zones, we could call for the inshore area of the Sussex Coast to be part of these zones.
Goodfish currently suggests;
One mile trawl free zone
Three mile otter & beam trawler (or all trawling?) restrictions
Six mile pair trawling restriction
Remove historic rights for larger boats to fish 3 to 6 mile out to sea
Goodfish seeks anyone's views on these ideas, but with sound and logical arguments please!
We think it makes common sense, commercial sense and environmental sense and challenges anyone to make reasoned arguments against this as a concept;
On the home page there is text that can be cut and pasted and sent to the Sussex Sea Fisheries Committee - Why not get involved and do your bit?
Please contact Goodfish to make your view - Contact
Whats happening?
Letters and questionnaires are being sent out to seek views on these ideas. Not a great flow of responses to date though, but a few fishermen, restaurants and fishmongers have given feedback.
A 3 mile pair trawling ban has been established in Guernsey - see link
Small inshore fishers need to play their part
If better rules are established for trawling, there also needs to be either voluntary or statutory rules for the fixed net fishers.
There would be little point in improving the fishery, for the fixed nets to expand and undo this opportunity.
These rules could include seasonal closures in selected areas or zones, changes to net mesh regulations and net lengths or a fleet size limit.
There are for example, super efficient under ten metre vessels that have a greater fishing capacity than much larger vessels. These have probably been designed to get around the existing rules and go against the original idea of an under 10 metre fleet.
Fixed net issues
When set correctly and with the optimum (sustainable) mesh size, gillnets as one example can be selective, with small fish swimming straight through the net and larger fish not getting their heads through enough to be caught by the gills.
Bottom gillnets have a less negative impact on the seabed than other bottom fishing methods such as trawls and especially beam and otter trawls.
Significant bycatch can occur with wrong mesh size or nets not set correctly, especially juveniles and crabs
Pots, 'creels', trap issues;
Specific species can be targeted by fishing certain areas and using specific types of bait, eg cuttlefish. Any juveniles or unwanted species that are caught can either escape through special exit openings or removed and returned alive.
There are few negative issues outside of any overfishing.
Better rules for better seas for all
Do we need large trawlers?
There will always probably be a need for larger fishing vessels and indeed trawlers such as beam trawlers, to ensure consistent and quantity supplies of fish for restaurants and fishmongers (small boats are not able to get out to sea in bad weather). However, better controls are needed to protect the environment and fish stocks from their industrial scale capability. Until this situation is improved, the best bet is to seek out Sussex Inshore Fish or local to where you live, caught by small day boats and / or MSC labelled fish.
Current Sea Fisheries Committee rules
Bearing in mind the pressures on fish stocks, the SSFC rules are considered inagequate with little restriction on trawling or other net fishing activity. I regularly see beam trawlers working close inshore when fishing on Brighton beach which has to be wrong.
Is it right that large trawlers can trawl mostly anywhere at most times in Sussex?
Segregating fisheries
As proposed by Natural England "Segregating the fleet effectively into offshore and inshore components, if correctly defined, could reduce the environmental impact of fishing in the inshore area and bring benefits to the local coastal community"
Goodfish ideas
A trawl free zone and further restrictions on large scale trawling along the Sussex coast (from the lowest low tide mark out to sea) concept is about conserving the near shore coastal environment and has previously been promoted in a similar form by the recreational fishing sector. It has some very pursuasive arguments (Goodfish opinion only) and also fits in with the Water Framework Directive (WFD) legislation. See below for more details / ideas.
Why have these ideas?
Better inshore rules could help enable the whole Sussex inshore fishery (as an example) to head towards MSC accreditation and deliver the WFD. It could also reduce conflicts with fixed net fishers, recreational anglers, divers and sailers. Indeed an enhanced environment / fishery will encourage these industries to thrive. Crabs, lobster and whelks for example could significantly increase their populations, whilst juvenile fish numbers could increase. Bass and bream stocks would be enhanced by reducing pair trawling activity. Overall rays, skate, sea horses, porpoises, rare shads and some sharks would also be better protected. The seabed would become more naturally functioning and overall this would enhance the small scale inshore fishing industry, supporting the local economy.
Warning
The small inshore fishing fleet would also need to agree to new rules to ensure it does not just expand and undo any good from the new trawling proposals.
80% of people in a recent survey said they wanted something done about overfishing and that a healthy marine environment is important to them - link to report
A recent study has suggested that discarding rates are very high in ICES area VII (includes the English Channel), particularly from trawlers (Enever et al, 2007). Within Area VII, an estimated 186 million (72,000t) fish and cephalopods were caught every year of which 117 million (24,500 t) were discarded. Beam trawlers and otter trawlers were together responsible for more than 90% of these discards.
These are large industrial scale boats and they should not be compared to the small-scale inshore day fishers - see article
A very useful summary document was produced by the Sussex Sea Fisheries Committee in March 2010;
If your business uses locally caught fish, from small boats that do not beam, pair or otter trawl, then the 'Coast Friendly' Initiative may be for you! Click here to find out about the trial that you could be part of.
Marine Protected Areas - Are they part of the answer?
Some commentators may argue that Marine Protected Areas (MPAs), currently being proposed, would deliver the benefits needed. It should be remembered though, that MPAs are a habitat protection measure and whilst these have helped fish populations in some tropical countries, in the UK the situation is not the same. Many tropical fish species are territorial and so spatial measure have a direct and clear impact. In the UK the commercial species range over a wider area and so the benefit to fisheries will be less significant. We need the combination of MPAs and other broad enhancement approaches as proposed above. A recent article by the BBC is a useful reference to this point - Casting a net far into the future
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Lets make a sustainable change; if we do not have the evidence
then take precautionary measures?
Although Goodfish has suggested the inshore fishers are less damaging
than others throughout this web site, there are still some ideas included for better
management linking also to an enhanced recreational fishery. We do not need years
more research and monitoring to know that some of these ideas will make a difference
1. Provide a dedicated fixed net and potting zone, restricting all trawling in the first three
miles out to sea and all pair, beam and otterboard trawling in the first six miles out to sea.
May need to restrict fixed nets to within the exclusive 6 mile zone with under 10m trawlers
outside the 3 mile zone
2. Establish a significant network of highly protected Marine Conservation Areas where no net fishing is allowed, but maybe allow sea angling with bag limits
3. Establish a net fishing free area for one mile from the shore (does not affect potting, line caught fish etc) during a specified season. No net fishing at any other time within 200m of the shore to avoid all conflicts with other sea users
4. New byelaws to restrict the scale and reduce bycatch of fixed net fishing methods
5. Introduce a sea angling licence with the money directly linked to the conservation of fish stocks. Remove licences from unlawful or rogue anglers (including undersize bass, litter and dangerous behaviour)*
6. Linked to the sea angling licence fund, establish flounder, mullet and bass as dedicated sport fish species, taking protection and management measures to enhance thier recreational sea angling potential. Mesh size for targeting bass for example could for example be greater than 110 mm to reduce the catch of 2 to 3lb fish
*A key to this might be by making a link between the fund from a sea angling licence with a reduction in the methods, areas and seasons fished by the inshore fishers ie we pay a fee for them not to fish for a period of time and to allow them to adapt to the changes, by buying new equipment for example. Maybe Defra could provide a 50 : 50 match with the anglers fund?
Let me have your views on this!
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