Billions offered in public aid to fish sector, including processors

EU - The EU has created a new funding tranche of €3.8bn for the bloc's fishing industry, giving primary producers, fisheries, aquaculture businesses, processors and marketers access to financial aid.

The new European Fisheries Fund (EFF), approved yesterday by the bloc's fishery ministers, will replace the current aid money from 1 January 2007. With fishing quotas in the EU sharply curtailed to accounting for declining stocks, the industry is having to adapt to extremely constrained and variable supplies.

The funding is meant to help businesses adapt to the difficult circumstances and become more competitive.

It will also target measures to protect and enhance the environment. Support will be reinforced for measures to help ensure the industry has access to the skilled labour force it requires, the European Commission said in a statement yesterday.

The decision also ends public funding "that has in the past contributed to increasing fishing capacity", the European Commission stated.

The EFF will run for seven years, with a total budget of around €3.8 billion. Funding will be available for all sectors of the industry – sea and inland fisheries, aquaculture businesses, producer organisations, and the processing and marketing sectors - as well as for fisheries sectors.

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Source: Food Production Daily

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