European Union countries have reached an agreement on their fishing quotas for 2026, without definitively settling the issue of a drastic reduction in mackerel catches, amid accusations of overfishing targeting Norway. One of the most sensitive points was mackerel, whose population has collapsed in the North Atlantic.
The situation is highly tense with third countries such as Norway, which is accused of overfishing and of disregarding scientific advice. “For mackerel, consultations among the coastal states of the North-East Atlantic (EU, Norway, Iceland, the Faroe Islands and the United Kingdom) are still ongoing,” the European Union noted in a statement.
EU ministers therefore “agreed on provisional limits for the first six months of 2026,” involving a 70% reduction compared with the previous year. This cut is slightly less severe than what scientists recommend (–77%).
Fleeing climate warming, Atlantic mackerel has migrated northward, only to become trapped by overfishing amid geopolitical disagreements. Its population has fallen into a danger zone where reproduction is no longer assured.
Another sign of the difficulty of the negotiations is that, for the first time in 40 years, Ireland will not be able to benefit from the “Hague Preferences,” a mechanism that grants it higher quotas for certain species. France, Belgium, the Netherlands, Poland and Germany opposed their application.
For other quotas, European states also approved an increase in catches of Norway lobster (nephrops) in the Bay of Biscay (+54%, except in the southernmost area) and a smaller reduction in pollack catches (–13%) than what the European Commission had recommended (–26%).
In the western Mediterranean, where fishing reductions had strained negotiations last year, European states have this time decided to maintain the same catch levels in 2026. The agreement “offers apparent stability” to Mediterranean fishers, but “fish populations remain under significant pressure after decades of overfishing,” criticized the environmental organization Oceana.
Source: tunisie numerique
