Based on international experience and stakeholder consultation, a methodological framework was developed for the impact assessment of Commission policy proposals to address discards. The framework was applied and tested in specific EU fisheries.
Why this study?
The Commission considers that by catches and discards in EU fisheries continue to remain at levels which are politically, economically, biologically, and socially unacceptable. The Commission, after identifying the problem of discards in European fisheries, has published a Policy Proposal to reduce unwanted by-catches and eliminate discards[1], alongside an Impact Assessment[2]. These two documents define the objectives of the Policy Proposal and develop the main policy options to tackle the issue in European fisheries. The Policy Proposal recognized that an implementation plan for specific fisheries would have to be developed to assess impacts on a fishery by fishery basis. In this respect, this study was initiated to develop a procedure to be followed for Impact Assessment of discards policy actions in individual fisheries.
Goals
Results
Discard policies were reviewed and evaluated in four case study countries (Canada, Iceland, Norway, and New Zealand) and three RFMOs (Northwest Atlantic Fisheries Organization - NAFO, Commission for the Conservation of Antarctic Marine Living Resources – CCAMLR, and the Indian Ocean Tuna Commission – IOTC). Experts were used in each case to gather and organize available information, such as a description of fisheries, a description of policy instruments used against discards and their efficiency and efficacy, the evolution of discards since the relevant policy was introduced, the socioeconomic impacts of the discards policy and relevant measures adopted to accompany, alleviate or compensate these impacts, and assessing any enforcement and control issues that have impacted the success of discard policy. The results and lessons learned from the case studies were applied in the development of the Methodological Framework, alongside the results of the stakeholder consultation.
The Methodological Framework was the main output of the project. It was intended to guide the evaluation of the likely impacts of individual regulations or specific proposals, which the Commission would prepare to implement the discards policy in specific fisheries. It particularly identified the types of data and information required to reach a full evaluation of the impacts and gave guidance on how the impacts interact in complex systems. A three-step process to analyze impacts was adopted:
To further explore the applicability of the main policy options in the context of Community fisheries, a stakeholder consultation was undertaken within four selected fisheries: North Sea flatfish beam trawl; North Sea pelagic trawl; Portuguese crustacean and finfish demersal trawl; and Portuguese pelagic trawl. ‘Test’ impact assessments were expanded for the North Sea flatfish beam trawl and the Portuguese crustacean and finfish demersal trawl, and used as a means of testing the methodological framework at the fishery level.
Several important elements emerged from this project:
Reference
Full title |
Impact assessment of discard policy for specific fisheries |
Organisations |
MRAG, IEEP |
Full report |
http://ec.europa.eu/fisheries/publications/studies/impact_assessment_discard_policy_2007_en.pdf |
[1] European Commission 2007. ‘A policy proposal to reduce unwanted by-catches and eliminate discards in European fisheries’ (COM(2007) 136).
[2] European Commission 2007. Accompanying document to ‘A policy proposal to reduce unwanted by-catches and eliminate discards in European fisheries’. Impact Assessment (SEC(2007) 380).
[3] European Commission 2005. Impact Assessment Guidelines (SEC(2005) 791).