NEWS | Wednesday, 19 November 2008

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Joe Borg under fire for ‘doctored’ report

European Commissioner for Fisheries Dr Joe Borg has been singled out for criticism by the Economist newspaper, among others, over the apparent censorship of a crucial report on bluefin tuna statistics, just ahead of this week’s ICCAT meeting.
It is understood the report detailed fishing and farming infringements of a number of EU member states, including Malta.
Dr Borg is currently in Marrakech, Morocco, representing the interests of the European member states’ tuna fisheries at the international regulator’s annual general meeting.
This AGM is believed to be of vital importance to safeguard the Mediterranean stocks of bluefin tuna, a critically endangered species, and also the fisheries which depend on the stocks’ recovery for their own survival.
But the lack of reliable data is likely to hamper the ICCAT meeting in its efforts to come up with a workable strategy that will help stocks recover, while safeguarding the interests of the fishing communities involved.
Earlier this year, Green MEPs requested a study on tuna population figures and inspections carried out by the Community Fisheries Control Agency (CFCA): an entity set up on the initiative of Borg himself earlier this year, specifically to combat illegal fishing.
The report was completed in August, and submitted to the European parliament November 6. It concluded that “it has not been a priority of most operators in the fishery to comply with ICCAT legal requirements”.
However, Spanish MEP for the European Greens, Raul Romeva, has accused the Commission of censoring this report under pressure from member states. Romeva claims that the original report was much longer than the 10-page version presented last month, and contained specific details of infringements by individual member states.
One third of the inspections carried out by the Commission revealed infringements, Romeva claims.
Meanwhile, an industry analyst who saw the full report in August confirmed with MaltaToday that Malta was in fact mentioned in connection with illegalities. However, the “sanitized” version does not refer to any countries by name.

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