From 1 January fishermen targeting pelagic quota species such as mackerel and herring now have to land all the quota fish they catch, helping bring an end to the wasteful practice of throwing fish back overboard.
Commenting on the start of the pelagic discard ban, UK Fisheries Minister George Eustice said: “The long fight to reform the broken Common Fisheries Policy has been won and today marks a significant milestone in our commitment to fish more sustainably by ending the shameful practice of discarding perfectly good fish.
“But our work is not over. While it’s widely recognised pelagic fishing operations have relatively low discard rates we will continue to work with fishermen to help them adjust to the new reforms and make the transition as smooth as possible.”
In the run up to Christmas, Norwegian fish farming company Marine Harvest announced it had completed the purchase of Chile's Acuinova S.A.
Marine Harvest paid a total of $125 million for the company - $5 million more than the initial purchase price, which Marine Harvest said reflects a higher biomass at sea.
In India, the Agriculture Minister, Radha Mohan Singh, has stated that there is a need to encourage public private partnership (PPP) in order to promote fisheries and aquaculture development in the country.
Mr Singh said a great awareness has been created in the fisheries sector, however, there is a need for adopting scientific attitude in this regard. Mr Singh also called upon the farmers to implement new techniques suggested by the scientists so that fish production may touch new heights.
Researchers in Japan have developed a new portable device that calculates the level of fat in fish.
The device, "Fish Analyser", is designed for fish wholesalers and retailers and is cheaper than other models and is able to determine the level of lipids in a fish in just 10 seconds, according to the Business Standard.
