On 24 April 2024, Muireann Kavanagh travelled to Strasbourg with her father Neily Kavanagh for a series of meetings facilitated by Sinn Féin MEP Chris MacManus. She highlighted the impact of the recent closure of the line-caught pollack fishery on the island and other communities.
Access the PR by IIMRO and LIFE in English here
Accédez au communiqué de presse de IIMRO et de LIFE en français ici.
In April 2024, Mulleres Salgadas officially joined the Low Impact Fishers of Europe. In the interview below, Sandra Amezaga, their Executive Secretary, tells us more about their incredible work, daily fights and hopes for the future.
Welcome to LIFE! We are very happy to have you as members of our platform. Could you tell us a bit more about your organisation, its origin, where you are, and where you work?
Mulleres Salgadas was founded at the end of 2016 as Asociación de Mulleres do mar de Arousa, with scope in the Arousa estuary and the provinces of A Coruña and Pontevedra. Subsequently, we decided to become an autonomous association and changed the name to Mulleres Salgadas-Asociación Galega de Mulleres do Mar, extending our action to the whole territory of Galicia.
How many shellfish gatherers does your organisation represent, how is your work carried out, and what fishing gear do you use?
There are currently 1695 members, 1296 of whom are shellfish gatherers on foot, which reflects the gender distribution of the different sea trades in Galicia. In addition, there are shellfish gatherers afloat, barnacle gatherers, etc.
Shell fishing on foot is an artisanal activity in which there have been few changes in gears and methods, although there have been changes in management. In addition to collecting bivalves, shellfish gatherers also sow, care for, regenerate, and clean the beaches.
Has the work of women shellfish gatherers always been carried out by women?
In contrast to shellfishing afloat, shellfishing on foot has been a largely female occupation, although a few men have entered the profession in recent years.
In a recent interview, you told us that the shellfish industry is going through a very complicated time in Galicia. Could you tell us what are the most important concerns of the sector right now?
Right now, the main concern is the mortality of shellfish on the beaches and the decline in shellfish resources. We are at a time when many of Galicia’s shellfish gatherers’ groups are ceasing activity or collecting very small quotas, which means a lack of income. Not all shellfish gatherers are entitled to receive the cessation benefit; furthermore, the procedures take a long time. There are still shellfish gatherers who have not received anything and have not worked since January. It is urgent to rethink the management of shellfishing as well as the requirements for obtaining the permits and the conditions to benefit from the cessation of activity.
Climate change is already directly affecting Galician fisheries. Other factors, such as pollution, poaching, etc., must also be addressed. It is very urgent to adapt to global warming, which is already here and has substantial consequences.
You also commented that shellfish gatherers do not have the same decision-making power in the cofradias as other members, such as small-scale fishers. Could you explain why this is the case and what could be done to change this?
Many conditioning factors lead to the lower presence of women in the management and leadership bodies of the cofradias, most of which are common to other professional groups and fields. Women have traditionally been relegated to the private sphere, to the home; they are responsible carers of the home and the family. There is an overload of domestic work, which, added to their professional tasks, leaves them exhausted and without time to devote to representation or to try to gain access to power. There is a perceived lack of motivation. This long-standing situation requires collective intervention and mentality change, including women and men. Furthermore, the Galician Law on Guilds does not help women to participate more. This law, dating from 1993, guarantees parity between workers and employers in the governing bodies of the guilds and considers that shell fishing on foot is included in the census of workers.
For us, the law on the cofradias must be modified entirely, seeking formulas for equal representation. This is one step, but not the only one we must take.
LIFE’s main mission is to bring together and raise the voices of small-scale fishers at the European level. How do you think LIFE could support you in your struggle to sustain the seafood sector in your region?
Despite the differences and peculiarities in the different areas, there are common problems where we can all benefit from each other’s experiences and contribute to finding solutions. LIFE is also an opportunity for the voices of many women who are not present in decision-making forums and who find it difficult to make themselves heard.
Access Mulleres Salgadas website here
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NUTFA, dedicated to the support, survival and development of the small scale fishing fleet in England and Wales, to close.
Jerry Percy, Director of the New Under Ten Fishermen’s Association [NUTFA] has announced the forthcoming closure of the organisation that has represented the under ten sector of the industry for many years.
Jerry said; “while it was always going to be a difficult decision to close, I’m not getting any younger and to be honest, I refuse to be party to what I see as the ongoing destruction of the under ten fleet.
I think it is a tragedy that the 80% of the fleet that are under ten metres have been treated so shabbily by administrations going back decades that has in turn resulted in such a lack of fish on the inshore grounds, the almost complete lack of effective management especially in terms of effort, the deafening sound of cans being kicked down the road when exactly the opposite approach is needed, [look at the unacceptable delays in controlling the ravages of the fly seine fleet in the Channel etc] and the lip service paid to the under tens by other organisations.
What I still fail to understand is the failure by successive administrations to recognise and reward the smaller scale inshore fleet and thereby ensure the sustainability of their presence in coastal communities. The inherent danger in the current situation facing them is that they are largely the keepers of the knowledge, skills, culture and heritage going back generations and that once lost will be almost impossible to recover.
Compare this with the increasing use of foreign crews and the consolidation of quota – over 50% of UK share is held by foreign interests then the prophetic words of an under ten skipper in The Last Fishermen film we made in 2012 come back to haunt us; “one day there will be one bloody great boat come up here, with Tesco written down its side and it’ll catch more in a day than we will in a year”. With the exception of the Tesco slogan [and they couldn’t even be bothered to keep their fresh fish counters going – every little helps] that’s largely where we are.
NUTFA has recently been criticised for a lack of ‘membership’ which may be convenient for those seeking to undermine the organisation but the claims don’t stand up when we have a voluntary database of over 1000 fishermen who clearly support our aims and objectives. We don’t charge a membership fee, not only because we do not have the admin capacity to handle it but also because so many in our sector are already on the bones of their backside and both Sarah Ready and I were content to work in a voluntary capacity although Sarah’s side of the work required funding for travel and court related costs that was not forthcoming, hence her recent retirement.
The overarching tragedy for me with regard to the current state of the inshore sector is that the men and women who are involved reflect all that made Britain what it once was. Resilient in the face of immense challenges, courage to keep going in conditions that others would shrink from, the ability to deal with anything and everything that life throws at them [with the possible exception of the MCA and DEFRA] and at the same time managing to stay positive in the face of sometimes crushing adversity.
So many of the under tens and non sector have said time and again that NUTFA was the only dedicated representative body that represented their interests and I’m sorry that they are going to lose that service. I can only hope that others take up the mantle and recognise that these guys are the true backbone of the fishing industry in so many coastal communities around our coast and step up.
If I’m honest, I will look back on my time with NUTFA and the other organisations I’ve been involved with, with a mixture of frustration at the lack of genuine representation and support from other bodies and the lack of recognition of their value by governments but overall with a massive sense of pride and honour to have done what I could to support them through difficult times”.
PRESS RELEASE
April 5 2024
The group made up of the Syndicat des Petits Métiers d’Occitanie, the Plateforme de la petite pêche artisanale, the Low Impact Fishers of Europe (LIFE), the Comité départemental des pêches du VAR and the Prud’homie des pêcheurs de la Ciotat (Bouches du Rhône) has applauded the decision on 28 March by the Administrative Court of Appeal (ACA) in Toulouse to uphold the annulment of a ministerial order setting out the arrangements for allocating the bluefin tuna quota granted to France for 2017. More than 7 years after going to court to challenge the legality of the allocation of bluefin tuna (Thunnus thynnus) quota, the group has not waited in vain.
After an initial ruling in its favour in June 2021, followed by the appeal lodged by the State in September 2021, this result raises the hopes of many small-scale fishers who face an unbearable situation in terms of the distribution of fishing quotas. Large vessels often monopolise quotas, leaving small-scale fishers with little or nothing.
The ACA simply confirmed the Montpellier Court’s 2021 ruling: Article L. 921-2 of the French Rural and Maritime Fishing Code lacks a legal basis. It governs the allocation of fishing opportunities based on three criteria, namely producers’ track record, market trends and economic balance, ignoring the integration of the environmental criterion into national texts required by European regulations and specifically art. 17 of the Common Fisheries Policy, which states that “Member States shall use transparent and objective criteria, including environmental, social and economic criteria.
The case of bluefin tuna is particularly emblematic of this unfair situation, with a national quota of nearly 7,000 tonnes almost entirely redistributed to Mediterranean industrial fishing for export.
Thanks to major management efforts, the bluefin tuna stock has been recovering over the past 10 years, and we can only congratulate ourselves on its good state today. This positive trend has led to an increase in the French quota from 3,226 tonnes in 2017 to 6,693 tonnes in 2024. However, its internal distribution is still very unbalanced between industrial and small-scale fisheries in the Mediterranean and the Atlantic.
The group hopes that this legal breakthrough regarding access to resources will have a tangible impact on the ground for the hundreds of fishers fighting for survival.
Read the full judgment in French: https://toulouse.cour-administrative-appel.fr/decisions-de-justice/dernieres-decisions/l-attribution-des-sous-quotas-de-peche-de-thon-rouge-en-zone-ocean-atlantique-et-mediterranee-doit-integrer-un-critere-environnemental
Contact: communications@lifeplatform.eu
Photo: Peix Nostrum
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