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The following Press Release was issued after NASCO´s Sixteenth Annual Meeting held in Westport, Ireland, during 7 - 11 June 1999
New, stronger measures designed to conserve wild stocks of Atlantic salmon were agreed internationally by the North Atlantic Salmon Conservation Organization meeting this week. The Annual meeting was held in Westport, Ireland at the invitation of the Government of Ireland.
The scientific advice indicates that in spite of restrictive management measures introduced both nationally and internationally in recent years, salmon stocks are still at seriously low levels. The reasons for the decline in abundance are not fully understood but appear to be linked to conditions in the marine environment. In the light of this difficult situation, agreement was reached on a multi-year measure for the West Greenland salmon fishery which restricts the catch to that amount used for internal consumption in Greenland. Under a regulatory measure for the Faroese fishery for the year 2000 a reduced quota of 300 tonnes was agreed with further limitations on fishing effort.
In order to give long-term protection to wild salmon stocks NASCO and its Contracting Parties agreed an Action Plan for implementation of a Precautionary Approach to salmon management. This is in line with international agreements in the United Nations. The Action Plan envisages the application of this approach to the management of salmon fisheries, socio-economic factors, introductions and to transfers, aquaculture, by-catch and habitat issues. The first step of the Action Plan will be to elaborate its application to the conservation, management and exploitation of salmon in fisheries.
NASCO is eager to cooperate more closely with the salmon aquaculture industry in the North Atlantic as there are risks of adverse genetic, disease, parasite and other interactions with the wild salmon. A Special Liaison Meeting was held to review the measures taken to minimise impacts of aquaculture on the wild stocks. The measures taken by Canada and Norway were highlighted this year and those taken by the European Union will be reviewed next year.
NASCO also decided to broaden the basis for its present cooperation with the North Atlantic salmon aquaculture industry and to initiate new links on an internationally acceptable code of containment and other issues of mutual interest.
There was a Special Session on habitat issues. Measures were also agreed to reduce the level of unreported catches and to consider the effects of by-catch in other fisheries.
A NASCO website will open shortly.
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