NGO condemns EU for failing to protect oceans

Attending the UN Ocean Conference in Brussels, Communications director for the Seas At Risk NGO Helen Willetts released a statement saying that EU leaders were paying little more than lip service to the issues, in one line accusing French president Emmanuel Macron of banning bottom trawling from areas in which it wasn’t done anyway.

The specific areas in question are known as MPAs – Marine Protected Areas – and Willetts says these and ‘the life they harbour’ have ‘been left to fend for themselves’.

“Only a handful of EU member states took steps towards protecting MPAs, while the vast majority took no decisive action to prevent destructive fisheries such as bottom trawling in these previous marine habitats,” she says.

“The underwhelming lack of ambition on EU MPAs is especially tone deaf given the EU’s recent publication of the European Ocean Pack, which claims to prioritise the protection and restoration of ocean health, which is in line with existing EU commitments to phase out bottom trawling in MPAs.

“While some countries including the United Kingdom are taking the right steps and banning destructive bottom trawling from MPAs, EU countries have failed to take action. Some countries showed sheer confusion in their stance, such as Spain, which publicly defended harmful bottom trawling while simultaneously announcing a fishing ban to protect a unique deep-sea reef in the Alboran Sea.

“In a pure box-ticking exercise, French president Emmanuel Macron announced a ban on bottom trawling in 4% of French waters where absolutely no trawling takes place.”

“The legacy of EU countries at this conference on ocean protection can be summed up as: ‘Do as I say, not as I do’,” said senior Marine Policy officer Tatiana Nuño.

“While the Commission president spoke on one stage about the importance of ocean health, EU leaders took to others to give industrial trawlers a free pass to destroy the seabed and the previous life it supports. Europe has the most trawled seas in the world, which makes the EU’s inaction on protecting its seas even more damning.”

Seas At Risk, with other parties, has called for infringement action to be taken against countries that continue to flout EU nature laws, it says.

Other harmful activities in MPAs include non-selective fishing gear that can result in by-catch; underwater noise created by shipping routes; mico pellet pollution; and oil and gas extraction. 

“It’s essential to carry out impact assessments before allowing any activity, and to have clear management plans that define which activities cannot take place,” said Willetts. “However, overall bottom trawling remains the greatest blanked threat to MPAs and their precious, interconnected ecosystems.”