Hake fishing in the Cantabrian Sea and the waters of Galicia and the Gulf of Cadiz may remain at 9,257 tons for Spain in 2019.
This Wednesday, Spain managed to maintain its hake quota in the southern fishing grounds after four consecutive years of cuts, compared to the 14% set by the European Commission (EC) in its proposal for the distribution of Total Allowable Catches and quotas for the Atlantic Ocean and the North Sea in 2019.
This means that hake fishing in the Cantabrian Sea and in the waters of Galicia and the Gulf of Cadiz may remain at 9,257 tons for Spain in 2019, according to the Spanish Minister of Agriculture and Fisheries, after 16 hours of negotiations with his European counterparts.
After four consecutive years of cuts (15%, 23%, 1.5% and 12%), maintaining the quota proved possible due to the “biological recovery” of the species, said the minister, who has classified the agreement as a “positive result” given the socio-economic importance of hake fishing in the southern grounds for Spain.
This is the main species for 650 fishing boats along the entire Atlantic coast from France to Cadiz, involving a total of 3,500 Spanish fishermen.