Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2008-07-09-Speech-3-495"
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"en.20080709.41.3-495"2
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"Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, when it comes to fisheries agreements, we Greens have an interpretation which is slightly different from those of the other groups. We regard fisheries agreements as falling not only under the heading of purely and strictly commercial agreements, but also under the heading of European policies. That is why I shall be referring to the opinion of the Committee on Development, which also emphasises our commitments on providing development aid and supporting democracy and good governance.
The question which we have already asked in the discussions within the Committee on Fisheries is why the Commission has threatened to terminate the fisheries agreements with Mauritania barely a year after they were signed.
As far as we are concerned, fisheries agreements are not merely agreements in which we are allowed to utilise a resource and pay for it, and when we utilise less we pay less. No, we are cutting fishing opportunities because the European fishing fleet has utilised less in the areas concerned. Yet is it Mauritania’s responsibility, is it Mauritania’s fault, if the European fleet has gone elsewhere for certain fishing categories?
We have always asked that fisheries resources be respected in other fisheries agreements, and we have always said that too much was being utilised and that in any case there would come a time when resources would be reduced. This is exactly what is happening at the moment. We agree with the Commission that resources should be restored to the level at which fishing is viable, and that that is a good thing. However, there is something else which we certainly do not agree with. During the discussions which took place we asked what would happen when the compensation is reduced in line with the level of fishing, so that the compensation would be reduced from EUR 86 million to EUR 70 million, which would mean that Mauritania’s income would be reduced by EUR 40 million over a period of three years.
You told us, ‘There is no problem. We cannot switch from the fishing quota to something different, and decide to work on development instead’. We understand this too, and you undertook, on behalf of the Commission, to ensure that there would be compensation for those EUR 40 million as part of development policy. Yet today, in this agreement, we cannot see any sign of this compensation except in a footnote which says that the possibility of compensation exists. So we do not believe in this compensation, and I think that you have deceived Mauritania to some extent in this agreement, because no provision has been made for the agreed compensation.
If you will permit, I should just like to remind you that when I was head of the EU mission covering the elections in Mauritania, the European Union undertook to support this young democracy, yet our first political act is to threaten to terminate the fisheries agreements. This is not, in my opinion, a policy of development aid, and I should really like to know what guarantee you can give us, as MEPs, regarding this compensation for the reduction decided on."@en1
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