Brexit: Uncertain outlook for EU ‘fish pond’ as sea boundaries are redrawn

When Donegal fisherman Cara Rawdon puts to sea from Greencastle on the Inishowen peninsula he doesn't have to steam too far before he is in British waters.

Technically, it's the EU's "fish pond", as the catches have been managed as a shared resource since 1983. In two years' time, however, Rawdon and crew of the Catherine R could be boarded by a British warship not far beyond the mouth of Lough Foyle.

"Greencastle really could be hardest hit of all the Irish fishing ports if Brexit goes ahead," Mr Rawdon told The Irish Times .

He was speaking at Bord Iascaigh Mhara's national seafood conference, held as part of "SeaFest" in Galway. A pre-conference "Brexit breakfast briefing" heard that the outlook for the sector was very uncertain, with Department of Agriculture, Food and Marine assistant secretary-general Cecil Beamish saying there was no clear view on the British position.

He noted that Britain was one of Ireland’s main partners for “quota swaps”, at around 4,000 tonnes of fish annually, while 25 per cent of all activity in Irish waters involved British-registered vessels.

With 22 per cent of all EU waters off Irish coast, and just 2 per cent of EU fleet capacity to catch it, Killybegs Fishermen’s Organisation chief executive Sean O’Donoghue was somewhat more forthright in warning against any deal which would put the domestic fleet at a disadvantage.

Oblivious to Brexit, fish know no boundaries, with some 40 different stocks moving between these two islands.

British National Federation of Fishermen's Organisations (NFFO) chief executive Barrie Deas forecast three possible scenarios. The first was unilateral action by Britain to set its own quotas and control its own waters, the second involved bilateral and trilateral negotiations on shared stocks with coastal states, including Ireland and Norway.

The third was a move to a regional management structure by coastal states, a type of “super-regional advisory council”, expanding on the regional councils established as part of the revised Common Fisheries Policy, he said., adding this scenario could benefit all EU coastal states.

“Fishing is too important to be left to governments, and we need to find a mechanism whereby the fishing industry has a greater say,” Mr Deas said.

The NFFO took a neutral stance before the Brexit referendum, aware that many fishermen had no great love for the EU due to the failure of successive common fisheries policies. However, Mr Deas said he was still very surprised at the result.

He said he believed it was now a time for "cool heads", and this was echoed around the conference boundaries by attendees like BIM gear technology expert Dr Peter Tyndall who, speaking in a personal capacity, said the CFP was just "one element" in a complex series of legal arrangements, and it could prove "impossible to unpick within two years".

Boat owner and former skipper Caitlín Uí Aodha from Helvick, Co Waterford, and Castletownbere Fishermen's Co-op manager John Nolan from west Cork believed the Irish industry needed to present a common front.

“We need to go back to the EU and say we were wronged in the 1973 accession negotiations, and we need a far greater share of quotas,” Mr Nolan said.

His Rossaveal, Co Galway colleague, Cathal Groonell of Iasc Mara, said that the EU policy towards greater scale was not necessarily of socio-economic benefit, and Brexit could represent "an opportunity to review policy overall, and see how smaller boats and smaller units produce far better results".

Ms Uí Aodha said that if the potential of Irish seafood was “as valuable as it was being billed” at the BIM conference, it had to be “fought for” – and “we now have our eyes open, in a way we didn’t back in 1973”.

“We could lose a lot of sea areas, which would make our quota situation worse, “Ms Uí Aodha said.

"And the Department of Agriculture, Food and Marine seems to think we can meet short supply due to scarce quotas with more foreign landings, but foreign vessels don't make for jobs onshore here. Spain wants its fish fresh, just like a ripe tomato," she said.

• The four-day national SeaFest continues in Galway with a Marine Institute ocean wealth conference at NUI Galway. The two-day public festival in Galway includes tours of the Commissioners of Irish Lights survey vessel Granuaile which is hosting an exhibition entitled "Safety at Sea Through War and Upheaval: Irish Lights 1911 – 1923" in co-operation with the Royal Irish Academy.