"WE are an Atlantic people." Waxing lyrical in west Cork, the Minister of State for the Marine, Mr Eamon Gilmore, borrowed, lines from a former Taoiseach, Mr Charles Haughey, last night to map out a confident future for the Irish fishing industry.
Current European Commission proposals to cut the size of the fleet were not acceptable given our special circumstances and the available opportunities, Mr Gilmore told the Glandore Summer School.
The Government would seek to maintain the size of the pelagic (mackerel/herring fleet) and would press Ireland's right to modernise its whitefish fleet one of the oldest in Europe.
Alluding to the island models of Iceland and Japan, Mr Gilmore said the Republic currently has 2.8 per cent of the total European tonnage.
Eighteen large pelagic (mackerel/herring) boats and 20 whitefish vessels are capable of all weather fishing. The core of the fleet is about 200 smaller whitefish boats.
Development of a midwater fleet, capable of fishing the Porcupine and Rockall banks safely in all conditions, was "the priority", he said.
Some two thirds of deaths at sea since 1990 occurred within the inshore fleet, where the average age of vessels was 30 years. This indicated the need for a new safety culture, coupled with modernisation.
Four centuries ago, fisheries brought great wealth to west Cork, and Spanish access to Irish waters dated back that far, he said.
The key challenge now was overfishing and the need to ensure that sustainable development was grounded in good environmental practice, Mr Gilmore said.
The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) had said that 69 per cent of the world's grounds were overfished and posed serious questions about dumping or discards, and industrial fishing.
Workings within the framework of the Common Fisheries Policy, the Irish industry had grown out of all recognition in the past 25 years, he said.
During the original EU accession negotiations, Ireland's white paper stated that 92 per cent of the total catch was caught in the inshore six-12 mile zone. These inshore waters now provided less than 25 per cent of the total take he said.
Mr Gilmore forecast a greater focus on restocking inshore waters.
The impending salmon management taskforce report indicated that the challenge now was to redefine salmon as a priceless resource, to be conserved and managed on a catchment basis, allowing for all legitimate interests, whether commercial or angling.
