Submission of statistical data on landings of fishery products in Member States

PURPOSE: Updating procedures for the submission of data on landings of fishery products in the Member States.

PROPOSED ACT: Regulation of the European Parliament and of the Council

CONTENT: Current legislation obliges the EU Member States to submit harmonised monthly reports to the Commission on data relating to the landings of fishery products. The data provided must include the quantity and value of landings in their ports. Recent studies on the collating of fish data reveals that improvements could be made to reduce the work load on the Member State authorities. The objective of this Regulation, therefore, is to allow for improvements in the collection of data relating to the quantity and value of fish landings. Other than minor editorial changes, the proposal has the unanimous support of the national fishery statisticians.

The proposed Regulation differs from existing legislation in three main respects. Firstly, submissions are to be based on annual rather than monthly data. This is useful for a medium to long-term evaluation of the market as well as allowing for a considerable reduction in the workload of the national authorities. Secondly, submissions are to be required by the flag (or nationality) of the vessels responsible for the landings. This requirement, compared to current submission by a broader group of EU vessels (such as EFTA vessels) will permit a more detailed analysis of the data, whilst not adding significantly to the national authorities’ workload. Thirdly, a more flexible approach to the use of sampling techniques in order to estimate the total landings. In other words the national authorities will be able to employ an appropriate level of sampling techniques for the collection of data.

Given that the proposal does not fall under the exclusive competence of the Community the proposal needs to be justified according to the subsidiarity principle. According to the Commission compatibility with the subsidiarity principle is assured in that the proposed Regulation’s core objective, namely the systematic collection of data on the landing of fish products in order to produce harmonised Community statistics, could not be achieved at a national level. Action by the Member States, acting without co-ordination at a Union level, would be both inefficient and ineffective. Experience has shown that Member States collection of data on the quantities and values of landings are varied with the net result that it is difficult to compare data effectively.

Lastly, the adoption of the proposal will lead to the repealing of existing legislation. It has no impact on the Community budget.