Considerations on COM(2014)129 - EU position in the Northwest Atlantic Fisheries Organisation (NAFO) - Main contents
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This page contains a limited version of this dossier in the EU Monitor.
| dossier | COM(2014)129 - EU position in the Northwest Atlantic Fisheries Organisation (NAFO). |
|---|---|
| document | COM(2014)129  |
| date | March 11, 2014 |
(2) Regulation (EU) No 1380/2013 of the European Parliament and of the Council[4] provides that the Union shall ensure that fishing and aquaculture activities are environmentally sustainable in the long-term and are managed in a way that is consistent with the objectives of achieving economic, social and employment benefits, and of contributing to the availability of food supplies. It also provides that the Union shall apply the precautionary approach to fisheries managements, and shall aim to ensure that exploitation of living marine biological resources restores and maintains population of harvested species above levels which can produce the maximum sustainable yield. It also provides that the Union shall aim to take management and conservation measures based on best available scientific advice, to promote fishing methods that contribute to more selective fishing and the avoidance and reduction, as far as possible, of unwanted catches, to fish with low impact on marine ecosystem and fishery resources and to gradually eliminate discards. Besides, the regulation specifically provides that these principles shall be applied by the Union in its external policy.
(3) By Regulation (EEC) N° 3179/78[5], the European Community approved the 1979 Convention on Future Multilateral Co-operation in Northwest Atlantic Fisheries (the NAFO Convention), which established the Northwest Atlantic Fisheries Organisation (NAFO) and was subsequently amended in 2007, ratified by the European Union in 2010[6]. Within the NAFO, the General Council is responsible for internal affairs and external relations and the Fisheries Commission is responsible for the adoption of conservation and enforcement measures designed to ensure the long-term conservation and sustainable use of the fishery resources in the NAFO Regulatory Area as defined in the NAFO Convention and to minimise the impact of fishing activities on marine eco-systems. Such measures may become binding upon the Union.
(4) In accordance with Article V.2 of the amended NAFO Convention, the NAFO Fisheries Commission and the NAFO General Council will merge upon ratification of this Convention to become the NAFO Commission.
(5) Pursuant to Article 218(9) of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union, the position to be adopted on behalf of the Union in Regional Fisheries Management Organisations when they are called upon to adopt acts having legal effects, with the exception of acts supplementing or amending their institutional framework, must be adopted by Council decision, on a proposal from the Commission.
(6) In view of the evolving nature of fishery resources in the NAFO Convention Area and the consequent need for the position of the Union to take account of new developments, including new statistical, biological and other information presented before or during the annual Meeting of the General Council and the Fisheries Commission of the NAFO (the NAFO Annual Meeting) , procedures must be established, in line with the principle of sincere cooperation among the Union institutions enshrined in Article 13(2) TEU, for the year-to-year specification of the Union position.