Technical measures for the conservation of fishery resources (16th amend. regul. 3094/86/EEC)

Parliament approved the Commission proposal with 34 amendments. In accordance with the substance of its resolution of 17 December 1993, it called for a complete ban on the use of driftnets from 31 December 1994 with the exception of those used inside a 12-mile radius of the waters of a Member State. In this case, the length of the nets should be limited to 2.5 km. The House also called for the establishment of financial aid in order to facilitate the conversion of the vessels concerned to other fishing techniques. It requested that a minimum of ECU 22 million be granted under the PESCA programme to establish compensatory measures in 1995 and, if necessary, a similar amount for 1996. Moreover, Parliament refused to include salmon fishing in the Baltic Sea in the scope of the regulation, since these problems were very different to those in the Atlantic. The Commission stated that it could not support an immediate ban as it would be impossible to establish adequate compensation mechanisms in the time frame proposed by Parliament. �