Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2001-12-13-Speech-4-104"
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"en.20011213.7.4-104"2
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"Mr President, the fisheries protocol with the Republic of Mauritania is of vital importance for EU fisheries. The previous protocol expired on 31 July 2001. This new protocol was initialled by both parties on 31 July 2001, fixing for five years the technical and financial conditions governing the fishing activities of Community vessels in the waters of Mauritania during the period 1 August 2001 to the end of July 2006. The provisional application of this protocol will depend on the first payment being made before 31 December this year. It is therefore of the utmost importance that Parliament delivers a favourable opinion this afternoon.
It is interesting to note that in 1995, following the unilateral termination by Morocco of the fisheries agreement concluded in May 1992 for a period of four years and in view of the likely problems of negotiating a new agreement with Morocco, the Commission initiated negotiations with third countries so that vessels prevented from fishing as a result of any loss of fishing opportunities off Morocco could, if necessary, be moved elsewhere. As a result, a supplement to the 1993-1996 protocol with Mauritania was adopted which aimed to offset the loss of fishing opportunities for the Community fleet in Morocco by allowing for 18 Spanish vessels to transfer to the waters of Mauritania, a geographical area close to where they operated previously.
In remarkably similar circumstances, the failure to renew the last agreement with Morocco, which expired at the end of November 1999, has again led to the need to seek increased fishing opportunities elsewhere in order to offset some of the hardship caused by the loss of access to Moroccan waters.
The protocol before Parliament today reflects this need. It allows for increased opportunities for EU vessels, while at the same time providing for greatly improved financial compensation for Mauritania – and I will deal with that later.
This new protocol with Mauritania is now the Union's most important protocol with a third country. Overall, the protocol offers allocated fishing rights for various species, or category of vessel, to Spain, Italy, Portugal and France. If licence applications from these Member States do not cover all the fishing opportunities fixed by the protocol, the Commission may take into consideration licence applications from other Member States.
The table in my report compares the fishing possibilities offered by the protocol under review with those available under previous agreements. From this table, you will see that, although there has been an overall increase over previous protocols, there has been a reduction for a number of stocks. There will be a 30% increase in the number of vessels, which averaged 42 under the previous protocol, to 55. According to the Commission, this measure was possible because opportunities had been created by the departure by a number of Far East vessels which used to target particular species.
There will be a 17% increase in the number of tuna vessels, from 57 to 67. The tonnage for vessels targeting black hake will remain the same at 8 500 GRT. For those targeting crustaceans other than crawfish (shrimps and crabs), the tonnage will go up by 9% from 5 500 to 6 000 GRT. However, it is important to note that there has been a reduction in the number of pelagic vessels permitted from 22 to 15. The total Community financial contribution will be EUR 430 million, broken down into EUR 86 million per year for the period of the application of the protocol. The EUR 86 million for the year comprises EUR 82 million in financial compensation and EUR 4 million for the financial contributions to fund the various types of fisheries-related assistance set out in Article 5 of the protocol. The government of Mauritania has full discretion regarding the use to which the financial compensation element is put.
Following the non-renewal of the fisheries agreement with Morocco, this new protocol with Mauritania is obviously of key significance. In this regard, it must be stressed that its principal importance does not lie in the scale of fishing possibilities that it offers or indeed in its cost.
From a Community fisheries and socio-economic point of view, its real interest is the hope which it holds out to people of the fisheries-dependent regions of Spain and Portugal, such as Andalucia, the Canary Islands, Galicia and the Portuguese south. These regions, which had so much invested in the Moroccan agreement, must be offered real alternatives as quickly as possible."@en1
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