WWF, the global environmental organisation, has condemned the outcome of the annual Fisheries Council decision on fishing quotas in EU waters for the coming year as "totally unsustainable". It says that the EU Fisheries Ministers have effectively "written off" cod in the North Sea.

In a statement issued today, WWF said that despite repeated scientific advice from ICES recommending zero catch for cod, the EU Fisheries Council has yet again given the green light to fishing cod in the North Sea.

"Not only has the Total Allowable Catch (TAC) over the last three years amounted to 81,000 tonnes in total, but the 2006 quotas for other fish stocks with significant accidental catches of juvenile cod - including nephrops - have also been increased since last year," the statmenent says.

"Nephrops (Dublin bay prawns) are one of Scotland’s most valuable fisheries and the independent scientists of ICES recently advised no increase in effort for 2006 for the fishery to remain sustainable.

"However, despite this advice, the EC has allowed a substantial increase in the catch for Nephrops fisheries around Scotland’s coasts, without incorporating adequate technical measures such as increased net mesh sizes, that are necessary to allow juvenile cod to escape."

Claire Pescod, Marine Policy Officer, WWF Scotland said: “It makes no sense to continue to allow targeted fishing on a stock that is on the brink of collapse, as Fisheries Ministers are with North Sea cod. In doing so they are ensuring that this iconic British species has virtually no chance of survival or recovery.

"On top of that Ministers have agreed to increased quotas for other species that are known to have a problem with a juvenile cod bycatch, pushing the final nail in the coffin of North Sea cod and jeopardising the future sustainability of other important fisheries and the fishing communities that rely upon them."

WWF says that with over 80 per cent of commercial fish species in EU waters now below safe biological limits or classified as being at risk of overfishing, the EU must listen and respond to ICES advice.

“If the EU continues this madness of setting quotas above what the species can support, other fish stocks will follow the same route to collapse as North Sea cod. Skates and rays in the North Sea, leafscale gulper sharks, Spurdog, and Portuguese dogfish are also near collapse but quotas have still been set - against independent scientific advice,” Ms Pescod concluded.

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