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Payout delay could hit cod recovery
6th June 2003
Fishing Monthly
THE longer transitional aid is delayed the less effect the cod recovery plan will have, an industry leader warned today.
And Alex Smith, President of the Scottish Fishermen’s Federation, said the delay in the aid payout is “absolutely ridiculous,”
Both the decommissioning and transitional aid schemes need EC approval but Mr Smith said they kept being told the approval procedure cannot be hurried and a Commission branch other than DG Fish was dealing with it.
“ I would have thought EC fisheries commissioner Franz Fischler would have been in a position to progress this, bearing in mind that the whole idea of the cod recovery plan, decommissioning and transitional aid is to try to cut back effort.
“This delay also affects the credibility of the Scottish Executive, because they put their hands in their pockets and came up with a £50million package which we have not seen anything of so far.
“But this means great uncertainty for those who have key decisions to make over decommissioning and whether to carry on in the industry.” In the meantime, many boats were choosing to stay at sea and making the best of things as far as they can.
“All this indecision on transitional means a lot of vessels are reluctant to tie up and are maybe putting some of their effort into unrestricted zones and also maybe hiring days off others to continue to go to sea.
“Quota uptake is already quite worrying particularly for monks.”
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