Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2001-04-05-Speech-4-027"
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"en.20010405.3.4-027"2
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"C
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Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, on the issue of the Morocco Fisheries Agreement, I have been very committed from the outset, that is, since I assumed responsibility for the fisheries sector. Before the previous agreement came to an end, I made contact with Morocco with a view to concluding a new fisheries agreement. However, that was roundly rejected by Morocco for many months. Concrete talks of a new agreement only became possible following a meeting with King Mohammed VI in Casablanca in October last year.
Secondly, the European Union is of the view that financial compensation must be reasonably proportionate to the offered catch facilities. Not only is this our general political guideline, it is also stated in the negotiation mandate of October 1999. In any case, we evaluated the financial part not only in purely economic terms; we also took political considerations into account, such as the need to have good political relations with Morocco.
In return for our proposal for a fisheries agreement we offered Morocco compensation of EUR 70 million for the first year, 60 million for the second year and 40 million for the third year.
This offer was very advantageous to Morocco for a number of reasons. Firstly, we calculated our financial compensation package on the basis of the fishing facilities in the final year of the previous agreement and not on the basis of the average of the last agreement. That alone means a price advantage of 15% for Morocco.
Secondly, in our calculation we made no distinction between types of fish, even though we would have accepted greater reductions in the case of more expensive and, for the European Union, more interesting types of fish such as cephalopods and shrimp. This also gives a price advantage for Morocco.
Thirdly, we did not take the landing obligations in Morocco into account in our calculation. Fourthly, in the end I increased the compensation resulting from the calculation by 20% in order to demonstrate that we understood Morocco’s concerns about the development of its own sector.
On top of all that, at the last meeting with the Moroccan Fisheries Minister, Mr Chbaatou, I once again made it clear that our offer, which I have described above, was a more than fair price for the catch facility. I also told him that we were once again prepared to fork out EUR 5 million a year to prove our good intention for the conclusion of an agreement.
However, the Moroccan Minister stressed that Morocco had no room for manoeuvre. Given the stance taken by Morocco, I do not see any possibility of concluding an agreement on the basis of our mandate. That is the message I will be taking to the Fisheries Council on 25 April. But the question of what will happen to the affected ship owners and fishermen, who have now been condemned to idleness for more than a year, is becoming increasingly pressing.
As you know, since 1 December 1999, we have made compensation payments to ship owners and fishermen out of the Fisheries Fund. We have made all our preparations in line with the conclusions of the Nice Summit. There is currently a Commission proposal with Parliament and also with the Council, whereby compensation payments will be extended to 30 June of this year. We have also proposed leaving the 4% limit out of consideration for compensation payments. We estimate that, so far, a total of approximately EUR 80 million have been paid out to affected fishermen and ship owners, 20 million of which were raised by the Member States themselves. This equates to a Community share of EUR 60 million, some 51 million of which have gone to Spain and 9 million to Portugal.
One thing is clear, however, additional measures and funds are necessary to secure the future of the Spanish and Portuguese fishing sectors. In my view, we must act in three key areas. Firstly, we should try to find alternative fishing facilities in other third countries, at least to a certain extent. Secondly, we must help to develop alternative employment opportunities for the affected populations, perhaps in aquaculture, or in tourism, or in the service sector, or wherever an opportunity arises.
Thirdly, as we do in other cases, we must also support the breaking up of vessels for which no alternative use can be found. To this end we will exploit all the room for negotiation at the disposal of the Commission. However, we will have to approach the budgetary authority in this connection regarding the 2002 budget. The next step must be for us to report back to the Fisheries Council. Finally, I would like to stress that I very much regret the unbending stance adopted by Morocco, which has made an agreement which is advantageous to both sides impossible.
Since then, seven political rounds of talks and thirteen technical rounds of talks have taken place. From the very beginning, the European Union was at pains to show the greatest possible flexibility so as to comply with Moroccan wishes and interests.
Following my visit to Rabat in February this year, I had to conclude that the gulf between the two positions could not be bridged, in particular, because of the compensation demands by Morocco for the catch facilities that were being offered. As regards fishing facilities, especially under the technical framework conditions of the fisheries sector, in other words, in which zones, at what times, and in what vessels, fishing could take place in Morocco, there were, in some cases, major differences of opinion.
Following my return in February, I immediately apprised the Council of the situation so as to sound out alternatives with the Fisheries Ministers. The Council requested me to make a final attempt to reach an agreement on the basis of the existing negotiation mandate. On that basis, on 26 March, I met Minister Chbaatou in Brussels. Unfortunately, however, this meeting too was a total failure.
During the course of the negotiations, the Commission put forward a number of proposals to promote the development of the Moroccan fisheries sector, for example, to provide resources to develop the port infrastructure and services sector in Morocco, to promote and develop coastal fisheries, to promote training and research and to develop aquaculture.
We would have accepted very extensive landing obligations in Moroccan ports, which would have meant a radical change in the traditional fishing activities of many Spanish and Portuguese fishermen, but would also have contributed to the development of the Moroccan sector. Moreover, we agreed to increase the proportion of Moroccan crewmembers on board vessels so as to improve the employment situation and the level of training in the Moroccan fishing sector.
In addition, we would have accepted further extensive reductions in catches in order to maintain resources in Moroccan waters. For example, in the first year we would have accepted a drastic reduction in the presence of the European Union in Moroccan waters compared with under the previous agreement. The following two years would have seen a phasing out of cephalopod and shrimp fishing.
We would also have accepted new technical conditions which would have been less advantageous for the Community fleet and would have reduced fishing costs. Despite this raft of concessions and despite the progress the Moroccan side has made following the negotiations, the following basic differences of opinion remain.
Firstly, the fishing conditions proposed by Morocco would have meant that the economic benefit for our fishermen would have been lost as we would have had to fish with considerably fewer ships in fewer fishing zones, and we would have had to accept longer periods in which fishing was banned."@en1
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