Examination of Witnesses (Questions 820-840)
Mr Geir Evensen and Mr Paul Oma
8 MAY 2008
Q820 Baroness Jones of Whitchurch:
We have seen what you have written about the discard ban and,
as the Chairman says, we are very interested to know a little
bit more about it. Can you explain how it fits with the quota
system, because if you have an operating quota system you must
be catching fish that are outside the quota, so how do you designate
those, and how do you enforce it to make sure that it works well?
Mr Oma: It is a complex system and it is difficult
to explain in very few words but I will try. First of all, you
are quite right that there are fish caught in Norway outside the
quotas, but all landings of fish, for instance, of cod, will be
deducted from the Norwegian quota even if it is illegal catch
from a vessel without a quota accidentally getting by-catch. When
he lands this, for which he has no quota, it will be deducted
from the Norwegian quota. However, the fisherman will not receive
any money or payment for this. He will only get a small compensation
to cover the cost of landing it. The general rule is that if you
land illegal fish or fish outside the quota you will receive 20%
of the minimum price in Norway. It is just an incentive for them
to land it, so they can legally land it but they will not have
any profitability from such activities. The basic principle is
that everything is counted against the Norwegian quota. There
are no free fish for Norway, so to speak. Also, before we divide
the quota to all the vessels in some fisheries, we take out what
we expect to be landed outside the quotas. That is one mechanism
we use. How do we enforce this? It is, of course, very difficult
to monitor everything that goes on at sea because the discard
ban has to be enforced at sea, of course, and we have traditionally
spent most of our effort on control at sea. The reason is obvious,
because we have this discard ban in place. We spend huge resources
on control at sea and the coastguard and the Norwegian Directorate
of Fisheries have approximately 20-25 vessels monitoring the sea,
but, of course, it is a huge area to cover from Svalbard in the
north to Denmark in the south, so it is a difficult task but we
have flanking measures in addition to the discard ban that help
us to monitor the discard ban. For instance, we have temporary
and permanent closed areas, which is a tool we use in order to
enforce this discard ban. If we have a certain area where it is
highly likely to get illegal fish which they have an incentive
to discard then we close the area, if you understand what I mean.
Q821 Baroness Jones of Whitchurch:
Have you noticed that people's behaviour has changed? In other
words, if they put their mind to it, can they realistically limit
the by-catch?
Mr Oma: With our system of closure of areas
and also the gear technology and technical regulations we believe
that we have changed the fishing pattern into a more sustainable
fishing pattern where we have improved the exploitation pattern
of the fishing fleet, fishing larger fish, leaving the juveniles
in the sea to grow. One of the benefits of this system is that
over the years since we introduced this system in 1987 it has
been widely accepted by the fishermen so everybody knows that
it is illegal to discard fish but they feel that perhaps it is
a bit wrong as well, so it becomes a moral issue for them. This
is a maturing process, of course. It has not always been that
way, and, of course, discarding happens in Norwegian fisheries.
We are not so silly that we believe that it has disappeared just
because we have introduced a ban. We believe that there has been
a change of mentality among fishermen as well.
Q822 Lord Plumb: Should the European
Union be following suit?
Mr Oma: Definitely we believe that it would
be beneficial to the European Union's fishing industry and we
also believe that it would be beneficial for the Norwegian fishing
industry for our shared stocks because in the North Sea the situation
is not good, to say the least. For certain stocks it is quite
bad and we believe that a discard ban would improve the situation
significantly.
Q823 Lord Cameron of Dillington:
Just so that I am clear, when there is fish caught that is over
quota, is it just that fisherman who has to leave the fishing
grounds or is the fishing ground then closed to everyone?
Mr Oma: That may vary. We have this surveillance
programme. A vessel hired by the Directorate of Fisheries sails
around in the Barents Sea and takes trial hauls, and wherever
their percentage of juveniles is too high or if the mixture of
illegal fish, for instance, red fish, Greenland halibut, is too
high then we will close the area for everybody, but in certain
cases, perhaps one vessel has quota and another one has not, only
the one without a quota has to leave the area. It is the fisherman's
own responsibility because the fisherman knows exactly what the
limits for by-catch and undersized fish are, so if he goes into
an area that is not closed and he discovers in his last haul that
the level is too high of illegal fish then he has an obligation
to change fishing grounds.
Q824 Viscount Ullswater: Can he purchase
quota on the high seas? If he finds his vessel is full of illegal
fish can he then buy the quota? Can he trade the quota at that
stage or does he have to buy the quota before he sets out, is
effectively what I am asking?
Mr Oma: You are talking about trans-shipment
at sea?
Q825 Viscount Ullswater: No. I am
talking about the fact that he goes out to fish legally and when
he hauls in his net he finds he has got fish for which he has
no quota or no further quota. Can he get on the radio and purchase
quota for that ship before he lands it?
Mr Oma: That is not known. I do not think that
is a realistic scenario.
Mr Evensen: I think he should bring it to land
and we will see if he gets compensation.
Q826 Viscount Ullswater: I was just
trying to think of a way of making money.
Mr Oma: No. The quota transfer system is not
that efficient.
Viscount Ullswater: It just would save on the discards
and save on the temptation to discard.
Q827 Viscount Brookeborough: As I
understand it, you run a survey ship which goes around the different
areas doing trials?
Mr Oma: Yes.
Q828 Viscount Brookeborough: If and
when it gets what it believes is the wrong size of fish it then
closes the fishery, just like that?
Mr Oma: Yes.
Q829 Viscount Brookeborough: Are
the fishermen relatively happy with the performance of that?
Mr Oma: They are happy with the service because
they have seen good results.
Q830 Viscount Brookeborough: It helps
them avoid problems?
Mr Oma: Yes, and it helps to preserve young
fish which then they can fish at a later stage. However, we have
been criticised quite heavily that we wait too long to open the
areas. There is no automatic system for reopening these fishing
grounds. They are closed until we have taken new tests in that
area.
Q831 Viscount Brookeborough: Do you
also rely on fishermen reports? If you have not got a survey vessel
there do the fishermen call in and say, "We are hitting too
many juveniles", and you then say, "Okay. We will close
it", on fishermen information?
Mr Oma: No. We will not close it based only
upon fishermen information.
Q832 Chairman: The Scottish Executive
have introduced this voluntary real-time closures scheme which
seems to be meeting with some success and is certainly being observed
by the majority of boats. Do Norwegian boats fishing in those
areas observe the real-time closures in Scottish waters?
Mr Oma: We were informed that these measures
had been introduced. However, to my knowledge channels of communication
about these closures have not been established between Norway
and Scotland, so I do not know. Of course, Norwegian vessels fishing
in Scottish waters should follow EU regulations but I am not informed
about how they observe these recommendations from the Scottish
Executive. If such communication channels were established I am
certain that Norwegian authorities would distribute this information
to the fishing fleet and we would, of course, highly recommend
them to observe these regulations.
Q833 Chairman: Can I ask a technical
point? It is to do with prosecution. We were talking to our own
people in Scotland last week and one of the problems that that
they have with prosecution is that although they have an aeroplane,
for example, going ahead and seeing that discarding is taking
place, they cannot prosecute unless they board the boat. Do you
have to board the boat and whom do you prosecute? The owner? Is
there a difference between ownership and the person in charge,
the skipper? How does the prosecution system work?
Mr Oma: We have zero tolerance for discard.
We do not have any limit, so if it is disclosed that there has
been discard it will be prosecuted and there will be fines and
administrative sanctions will apply to that vessel. We can, of
course, board.
Q834 Chairman: You have to board?
Mr Oma: No. We can discover that in different
ways. Also, video evidence taken by aeroplanes or helicopters
has been used.
Q835 Lord Palmer: We have been very
impressed by nearly all the witnesses we have had since doing
this inquiry. However, Norway comes out with your flag-flying
very high, particularly with regard to your control and enforcement.
Why do you think the Norwegian control system has been so successful?
We are all green with envy. Everybody has been so complimentary
about your method of control. Also, how effectively do you work
with your counterparts in other jurisdictions?
Mr Oma: I will try to start to answer that and
then my colleague, Mr Evensen, will say a few words on how we
co-operate with sales organisations in this matter. We really
appreciate it if other evidence that you have heard has suggested
that the Norwegian system is a success, but we believe that there
is room for improvement in the Norwegian system and we are continuously
trying to do that. As I mentioned earlier, we have focused mainly
on control at sea in previous years. However, since we got clear
indication of a large-scale IUU fishery in the Barents Sea we
have focused more and more, in addition to control at sea, on
control at landings, document control. We try now to investigate
the whole value chain from sea to the consumer, but we have not
increased our control effort on landings on the coast over control
at sea because that will always be the cornerstone of Norwegian
control. When it comes to co-operation, we have a fairly good
system for document control in Norway now and perhaps my colleague
can elaborate on that.
Lord Cameron of Dillington: Just before you come
to that, you have a huge number of rules, including your by-catch
limits, your trawler-free zones, your no discards, you called
it earlier "sophisticated technical measures", a very
good phrase. You must have an enormous police force doing all
this. Do you have any idea how many vessels, how many aeroplanes,
how many people are involved?
Q836 Lord Palmer: You mentioned 25.
Mr Oma: The coastguard and the Director of Fisheries
together have approximately 20-25 big vessels and maybe some smaller
ones for fisheries in the fjords, and we have a force of maybe
50 or 60 inspectors.
Mr Evensen: Yes, I think so. What is working
very well in Norway is the system with sales organisations. It
is based on the old Raw fish Act, which is a trade act. Originally
it was (and still is) an effort to police the fisherman and to
ensure that the fisherman receives reasonable value for the fish.
We have a system with sales organisations. They are allowed to
set minimum prices. They try to look at the market to see what
is the situation now and they set minimum prices which the buyers
have to respect, but every time fish is landed in Norway, or,
if you take Norwegian vessels, wherever they go in the world they
are obliged to fill in a landing note which is sent to the sales
organisation they belong to. We have six sales organisations.
By doing this the sales organisations know all the time what they
have been fishing, where they have been fishing, when they did
it, and they send this information to the Directorate of Fisheries
which then uses it to manage the quota. This is not something
you can choose; this is an obligation. That is the secret. In
the EU it is voluntary membership of the producers' organisations.
That is not the fact in Norway. You do not have to be a member.
Also, foreign vessels have to respect the sales organisations.
They have to issue this landing note, so it means we have a very
good overview of what has been caught. We have the necessary data.
The sales organisations have been around for 60 years. They know
very well how things work. It is not that easy to try to go around
them. It might happen but it is a very transparent system and
so we believe this is one of the most important factors in our
control. This Act is, as I said, an Act according to how we organise
the market but the consequence is that it is very useful for finding
out where the resource comes from.
Mr Oma: Just to answer the last part of Lord
Palmer's question, when it comes to international co-operation
we should be very humble from the Norwegian side because we would
not have seen the resource we have seen in the Barents Sea without
international co-operation, and in particular we have had very
fruitful co-operation with the European Union which we have worked
with also on a Member State level, exchanging landing information,
and we are working with the European Union within the North East
Atlantic Fisheries Commission to get this Port-State control scheme
in place which is the main reason why the IUU fishing in the Barents
Sea has been reduced by more than 50% over the last year. This
Port-State control scheme is very important and very useful in
combating in IUU.
Q837 Viscount Brookeborough: These
landing notes which you say are very good, who verifies them?
Do they have to be signed by the port at which they have landed?
Mr Evensen: They have to be signed by both the
buyer and the fisherman.
Q838 Viscount Brookeborough: This
landing note is a Norwegian note. Do they then have to hand a
note to the port authorities where they have landed, and is it
just between the buyer and the fisherman?
Mr Evensen: Yes. They are submitted to the sales
organisation and they will collect them and then send them to
the Directorate of Fisheries. I should also mention that the sanctions
are serious if you fail to do that. Imprisonment is an option.
Chairman: Let us finish of with the liaison with
the North Sea RAC and the possible regionalisation of fisheries
policy.
Q839 Lord Plumb: We have taken evidence
from some of the representatives of the Regional Development Councils
which, as you well know, were set up after 2002, and we have questioned
everybody on the advisability of using the RACs, their role and
their responsibilities. What level of co-operation do you have,
particularly with the North Sea Regional Advisory Council, and
do you see this as an important part of the possibility of further
development in the ref of the Common Fisheries Policy?
Mr Oma: We promised you that we would not talk
about the Common Fisheries Policy, but since you ask, this is
a question that Norway has no formal position on. However, we
do participate in the North Sea Regional Advisory Council as an
observer. We are also an observer in the Pelagic RAC. We attend
meetings and executive committees and general assemblies but we
are not active in the working groups in these two councils. I
have discussed this issue with some of my colleagues and our reflections
are that we believe that since there are such big differences
between regions within the EU when it comes to the fishing fleets,
the species that are being caught, the fishing gear, tradition
and not least the traditions for regulations, it would be difficult,
looking from outside, to create a system that fitted all. I believe
that from the Norwegian side we share perhaps more the traditions
for fisheries management with the countries around the North Sea,
such as the UK, Denmark, Germany, the Netherlands and maybe Sweden.
If the CFP were to be regionalised I think it would perhaps become
easier to find a common position between Norway and the EU in
negotiations on technical regulations, quotas, what-have-you,
but, of course, this is speculation. I do not know where or how
this processes in the EU will go. It has just started, I have
learned. Regionalisation will certainly affect the relationship
with Norway and I think it may have some positive impact on the
relationship. I have to stress that relations on the management
side are quite good at the moment. We have not many outstanding
issues on negotiations when it comes to the division and allocation
of quotas. We have for many years have been working to find agreement
on these two important issues and we co-operate quite well with
the European Union.
Q840 Earl of Arran: To speculate
even further, what would your view be if the CFP were scrapped
altogether and it was a free-for-all?
Mr Oma: Certainly from the Norwegian perspective
our concern is that we have to come to agreements with the European
Union on management in the North Sea and we have to agree upon
exchange of quotas from the Barents Sea to the areas west of the
UK and Ireland. This is a very difficult question. I cannot comment.
My imagination is not good enough.
Chairman: Thank you very much for coming and spending
time with us. It has been very interesting.
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