EU faces battle over fish quotas

By Chris Mason BBC News, Brussels

Jobs in Scottish fishing communities are at risk as the industry shrinks

EU fisheries ministers are meeting in Brussels shortly to decide how much fish can be caught from Europe's seas next year.

The two-day summit is likely to prove controversial, as governments balance the needs of a rapidly shrinking industry with protecting fish stocks.

Thousands of jobs have been lost in Europe's fisheries in the last 10 years - including 4,000 in the UK.

Many say stringent regulations imposed by the EU are to blame.

But environmental groups say stocks such as cod, tuna and herring have been fished almost to extinction in some European waters. They say the regulations, which represent a compromise between the industry's outlook and scientific advice, are dangerously complacent.

This meeting is expected to raise the quota for North Sea cod by 30% - in the hope of reducing the number of so-called discards, where fish have to thrown back into the sea, dead or alive, because quotas have already been exceeded.

Critics say this practice of discarding is ridiculous and morally reprehensible.

For others, the annual spectacle of European ministers bargaining for fishing rights is cumbersome and counterproductive.

The environmental lobby group Greenpeace claims that unless Europe's remaining fishing fleet is cut in half, the industry has no long-term future.

Some 2,000 jobs are thought to be at risk in Scottish ports such as Stornoway and Oban because of a proposal from the European Commission to make prawn fishermen modify their nets so they do not catch cod and haddock by accident.