Fisheries sector in Sweden and Finland: restructuration over the period 1.1.95 - 31.12.96

This proposal for a decision aimed to restructure the fisheries sector in Sweden and Finland for the period from 1 January 1995 to 31 December 1996 with a view to achieving a sustainable balance between fishery resources and their exploitation. This measure was justified as a result of the intense efforts to restructure the Community fisheries sector in Regulation (EEC) No 3760/92 within the framework of the multiannual guidance programmes (MAGP). These MAGPs laid down objectives for the reduction of fishing effort over the period 1992-1996 of 20%, 15% and 0% for demersal, benthic and pelagic fisheries respectively in order to balance the size of the Community fleet with the available resources. To this end, at least 55% of the fishing effort reductions would be purely by capacity reductions. With the accession of Finland and Sweden to the Union, the European fleet had grown considerably and the fleets of these two Member States therefore needed to be controlled according to the same principles as those defined by the MAGPs for the rest of the Community, but to a lesser extent than those applied in the other states since these adjustment measures covered a shorter period (from 1 January 1995, the date of the states' accession to the Union, to 31 December 1996, the date of the end of the MAGPs, instead of from 1992 to 1996 as for the rest of the EC). The proposal thus stipulated that by 31 December 1996 the fishing effort of the fleets of Sweden and Finland should have decreased by: - 8% for trawlers bottom-trawling for demersal stocks, - 6 % for dredgers and beam trawlers targeting benthic stocks, - 0 %, i.e. no growth, for the other fleet segments, as compared with the estimated situation of the fleet on 1 January 1995. Moreover, at least 55 % of the effort reductions should be purely by capacity reductions. �