Times have been hard for the groundfish fleet. First there was the spiral of rising fuel prices that hit the previously profitable but fuel-hungry beam trawl sector very hard, resulting in some very significant changes as the fleet quickly diversified into seine netting, twin-rigging and more economic variations of the traditional beam trawl, but the drop in fish prices has been a killer blow, falling by around a third over then years.
As things came to a head at the beginning of the year, it was clear that even with less fish available, prices were still painfully low.
