A jaunt to Iceland for an exhibition there last month would have been ideal – but there are only so many hours in the day and so many places you can be – and while the many fishing industry exhibitions give you a concentrated snapshot of much of what’s happening in the fishing industry, you’re left with a lot to distill.
There’s plenty going on. Shipyards are knocking out new fishing vessels at a respectable rate, there’s innovation in equipment and techniques – with the usual undercurrent of concerns alongside the good news.
The North-East Atlantic’s mackerel TAC has been significantly lifted, following new and more detailed research in the wake of what would otherwise have been yet another cut. Fishing people and industry observers had been shouting for a few years that there’s far more mackerel in the ocean than science and government were aware of. But science and government don’t work fast – and the default position is always a reduction.
So it’s heartening and encouraging that for once the industry’s concerns have been listened to and acted on.
Things are changing. That’s a given. Cod are rapidly making their way from the southern North Sea and heading northwards at a smart pace, while Baltic cod don’t appear to have a bright future ahead of them. Unfortunately, without a fully-functioning crystal ball there’s no way to predict where this is might be going, other than that things are changing at an alarming rate.
And then there’s the politics… as fishermen’s organisations across Europe have one eye permanently on BBC news in the forlorn hope that some kind of resolution might finally be reached in Westminster, ready for the whole thing to creak into action again for the long process of negotiation that could well make the last three years look like a breeze.