More than forty years after the EU established a common fisheries
management system, aimed in particular at preserving resources andensuring fair access, the situation, while predictable, is nonetheless
bittersweet. Resources are still dwindling, the small-scale, local,
artisanal fishing that provides a livelihood for coastal communities is
moribund, and the industry is still increasing its revenues. The purpose
of this text is to look back on these decades of the CFP. As the latter
has undergone numerous reforms, this text is not intended to provide an
exhaustive assessment, but rather to provide some keys to understanding
the slow but sure destruction of small-scale fishing activities in
France. ---- A Brief Look Back at the Origins of the CFP ---- The Common
Fisheries Policy was initiated by the EU in 1983. Its aim was to adapt
the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), which had proven itself in
supporting the industrialization of agriculture, to the fisheries
sector. The European Union's main objective during the first CFP was to
promote European access to low-cost European seafood products in order
to face international competition. In practice, this consisted of
encouraging overfishing to lower consumer prices. This was achieved, not
without pain, so much so that Greenland, whose fishing was then one of
its main sources of income, voted to leave the EEC in 1982, for fear of
losing control over the management of its fisheries resources. Indeed,
the specificity of the CFP at its inception (and this is still the case)
is that it recognizes the fact that fish become a "common resource." The
management of this resource must therefore be "collective" and thus
falls outside the scope of national jurisdiction. The EU thus becomes
the conductor, and decisions on the harvest of fisheries resources are
then made at the European level by the various ministers responsible for
fisheries. While the determination of quotas is revised annually, the
broad guidelines of the CFP are adjusted every 10 years. But the
observation is clear: with the European fisheries policy, the number of
vessels is in free fall, the number of jobs is also in free fall, and
the concentration in favor of the industry is clear, which reinforces in
passing (and deliberately to avoid any transnational organization of the
profession) a feeling of nationalism within fishing communities.
Accusing the Spanish, English or Irish neighbor, also small fishermen,
of plundering or favoritism in the determination of quotas, when they
are subjected to the same policies as French fishermen, becomes easier
than questioning the "all-industrial" policy, which rolls out the red
carpet for the multinationals in the sector. In short, it's easier to
target foreigners than capital...
The Prior Catch System
In parallel with this highly complex European system, which is difficult
to monitor and constantly changing, another specifically French system
distributes quotas according to the principle of "prior catches." In
France, quotas are allocated to a vessel, not to a fisherman. The annual
French quota allocation, decided by the EU, is based on a vessel's
fishing history. Simply put, if a vessel has fished well in previous
years, it will be allocated at least a similar quota, but possibly a
larger one. This obviously poses problems for young people fresh out of
fishing school who would like to acquire a small vessel or establish
themselves in the small-scale coastal fishing sector. Indeed, when a
vessel is resold, if the seller has not taken any specific steps to
retain their quotas, they revert to the buyer along with the vessel, but
at a very high price, unaffordable for the majority of young fishermen.
In the end, it's often subsidiaries of large-scale fishing companies
that buy the vessel and take over the quotas, which are then transferred
in one way or another to a vessel owned by the same company. If the same
young fisherman decides to buy a used boat with no fishing history, he
or she will then have to negotiate with the relevant authorities (often
close to the industry) to recover the remaining quotas, often for
species that are less exploitable or less valuable. As a result, it's
very difficult for a new fisherman to establish himself in small-scale
coastal fishing, because the system is once again designed to
concentrate fishing opportunities on those who have the means: the industry.
Industry vs. Small-Scale Fishing
As we will have understood, this European management therefore leads to
a concentration of capital linked to fishing towards multinationals
which own the largest factory ships and use, over the course of
technological advances, fishing methods which make it possible to
control and predict as much as possible the profitability of a trip to
sea. Until then, fishing remained one of the only professional
activities whose profitability depended greatly on uncontrollable
factors (the capture or not of fish). The only industrial "harvesting"
activity, so to speak... At the top of the list, and to name just a few,
are two Dutch multinationals:
Parlevliet & van der Plas, which owns, among other things, capital
shares and subsidiaries across Europe (and the world) to operate
trawlers in the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Ireland, and almost
everywhere else on the planet when maritime resources are exploitable.
Cornelis Vrolijk, who bought the France Pélagique shipping company
(owner of the giant trawler Scombrus, which made headlines at the end of
the Covid crisis) and owns shares in other Spanish and Dutch shipping
companies.
The problem posed by this concentration of companies within a single
group is twofold. On the one hand, it concentrates a large portion of
the quotas in the hands of a handful of European industrialists
established across all European coastlines. On the other hand, these
industrialists operate giant pelagic trawlers targeting primarily
"forage fish" (mackerel, herring, sprat, etc.) to produce fishmeal for
agribusiness (primarily aquaculture) and not for the human food market.
Moreover, these pelagic fish are at the bottom of the food chain and are
partly the basis of the diet of many coastal fish (exploited by inshore
fisheries), birds, and marine mammals. Their overexploitation is leading
to changes in ecosystems and the food chain. (1)
Small-scale fishing reduced to the status of folklore...
Faced with this industrial steamroller imposed by Europe and the French
government, it is clear that coastal fishing, whether artisanal or not,
is no match for the industry. To take Marseille as an example, the
number of vessels equipped for professional fishing has lost 45% of its
fleet in 20 years. While this doesn't just concern artisans, the number
of small-scale local fishermen has actually declined dramatically (2).
The reasons are multifactorial, but while the CFP has obviously had a
significant impact, Mediterranean fishermen are also greatly constrained
by the increase in coastal tourism and the development of nature
reserves. If artisans continue to sell their fish in the Old Port of
Marseille, a place with strong tourist appeal, it is because this
"typical" activity must remain present for the image of the city.
Indeed, while a minority of Marseillais who can still live near the port
continue to buy their fish in this daily and historic sales area, the
fish sellers are mostly at the mercy of tourists' smartphones, who
photograph this typical and lively local scene... but how many of these
tourists leave with a monkfish or a squid in their hand? Although this
example is not unique and can be found with its local specificities in
the Basque Country, Brittany or on the Channel coast, the status of
small-scale fishing, which does not represent, due to its scale, any
danger, either for the resource or for the industry, has become over
time a tourist activity. It can also be noted that some tourist actors
on the coastal strip have developed a new market by offering sea trips
in the middle of the tourist season to "see how fishing was practiced
before". We are therefore arriving at the height of the disintegration
of this activity, where professional fishing is also emerging as an
actor in the tourist industry, instead of providing healthy food for
people who frequent the coast. Consumers, fond of seafood, even those
living on the coast, will mostly settle for fish from industrial
sources, sometimes from the other side of the world (3).
Prospects for Collective Reaction
It must be recognized that in this European context, both short- and
long-term prospects are not easy to grasp, whether in terms of the
future of fisheries resources or the survival of this small profession.
And yet, fishing strikes, port blockades, demonstrations-these
mobilizations have punctuated its history, whether to complain about
increasing costs (mainly fuel), the orchestrated destruction of the
fleet, unfair competition from Danish or Dutch industrial fishermen, or
even, more recently, against the installation of offshore wind farms in
fishing areas, the impact of which on marine resources is too little
understood. These mobilizations, while often spectacular (4), remain
defensive actions and will never have prevented fishing, and especially
small-scale fishing, from sinking to the benefit of industrial fishing.
It should also be noted that the industry remains rather poorly
organized. Unions are scarce, and the few professional organizations
(the national fisheries committee and regional fisheries committees)
remain in the hands of management teams often close to the largest
industrialists, and are in any case content only to defend economic
interests within the very system that is destroying them. This
small-scale fishing sector is occasionally seeking to organize itself,
by creating its own labels or local fishing associations. But here
again, while this allows for the survival and significant value of their
small-scale production (and that's already good), these initiatives are
often, unfortunately, born out of an economic need for survival and are
in no way offensive organizations against the industry and the EU, the
sources of their disappearance. To conclude this brief overview, while
it is essential to support small-scale fishermen in a dynamic of
sustainability for small local communities and in the fight against
European policies regarding marine resource management, it would also be
highly inappropriate to mythologize the artisanal fisherman. Indeed,
without generalizing to the entire profession of small-scale and
artisanal fishermen, a fishing boss, even one precarious and in the
process of disappearing, remains a boss. The capitalist drift, against a
backdrop of communitarianism linked to the exploitation of resources,
even on a small scale, remains clearly observable in small ports and
within micro-enterprises in the sector. In itself, this profession is
not immune to the dynamics visible throughout French society and in many
struggling professions, and fishing "correctly" while respecting the
resource does not prevent the vicious exploitation of sailors. Arturo,
February 2025
Notes
(1) https://europe.oceana.org/wp-conten...
(2) https://www.paca.developpement-dura...
(3) The main fish consumed in France are still salmon, tuna, cod, and
Alaska pollock, species from aquaculture or fisheries far from the
French coast. Moreover, while fishing is collapsing in France, the
country remains a major importer of seafood. In 2021, 2,117,000 tons of
seafood were consumed by the French, while French production (fishing
and aquaculture) represents a tonnage of approximately 400,000 tons.
https://www.planetemer.org/infos/ac...
(4) As in February 1994, when the national demonstration of French
fishermen against falling selling prices and European competition was
heavily repressed by the police and ultimately resulted in the
apparently accidental burning of the Brittany parliament.
http://oclibertaire.lautre.net/spip.php?article4393
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