TECHNICAL measures including real time fishery closures to reduce discards and protect marine habitats in EU waters have been adopted by the European Commission.
Member states and Regional Advisory Councils (RACs) will now be able to present discard reduction plans to the Commission which, if accepted, may lead to derogations from certain technical measures.
New measures which would apply throughout the North Sea and North East Atlantic include:
provisions for member states to implement real-time closures of areas where strong concentrations of juveniles are detected for periods of up to 10 days;
a reduction in the number of species subject to a minimum landing size to focus on the target species of the fisheries concerned;
the general application of the Northwest Atlantic Fisheries Organisation (NAFO) rule that, when undersized fish account for more than 10% of the catch of a target species, the vessel must change gear or move on; and
greater flexibility in the application of by-catch...
