 270+ of these vessels belong to the EC fishing 

 fleet and 30+ of these vessels belong to the non-EC 

 countries.' 



 The EC vessels must be deployed off Argentina or 

 Namibia in the near future to avoid bankruptcies. 



 If EC negotiators are unable to conclude 

 agreements with Argentina'' and Namibia, then over 

 200 additional EC vessels could be converted to non- 

 fishery use, sold, or scrapped. 



 Non-EC countries have one-third the number of 

 high-seas vessels and a only few of these vessels 

 (possibly 30) could be sold to fishermen in other 

 countries. 



 Canada's East Coast fisheries are facing 

 tremendous pressure in the face of complete 

 moratoriums on fishing and this may tempt some 

 Canadian fishermen to consider selling or reflagging 

 their vessels in the future. 



 Reflagging became significant in 1993, as 100 + 

 West European fishermen reflagged their vessels in 

 Belize, the Cayman Islands, Cyprus, the Dominican 

 Republic, Honduras, Malta, Panama, or St. Vincent. 



CURRENT fflGH-SEAS nSHING 



Despite a fleet of nearly 800 high-seas fishing 

 vessels, only 7-8 West European-flag vessels are 

 believed to be currently fishing on the high-seas in 

 the Atlantic and Pacific in 1993. The vessels that 

 currently fish the high-seas include: the German-flag 

 Jan Maria, the Dirk Dirk, and the Gerda Maria' and 

 the Dutch-flag Dirk Diederick, Franziska, Cornelis 

 Vrolijk Fzn, and Zeeland.^ These vessels are built to 

 roam the oceans of the world, catching or 

 "kondiking" (buying), processing, and freezing up to 

 250 tons of herring, mackerel, or horse mackerel a 

 day. One tuna purse seiner, the Isabel Tuna, flying 

 the Cypriot flag, is currently fishing in the Eastern 

 Tropical Pacific. A Spanish tuna purse seiner, the 

 Montedaro, reportedly sank in this same area on 

 July 14, 1993.' The non-EC countries also fish 

 close to home, in the North Atlantic or Mediterranean 

 and a few non-EC fishing firms operate a small 

 number of joint venture operations in distant-water 

 fisheries. 



FUTURE FLEET DEPLOYMENT 



EC countries will deploy or decommission 

 approximately 270 high-seas fishing vessels. Spain, 

 Portugal, and the United Kingdom will mainly 

 redeploy their vessels in the next 2 years, but some 

 vessels may be decommissioned. Greece, France, 

 Germany, and Denmark, will mostly decommission 

 their vessels. Some vessels may be involved in joint 

 venture arrangements allowing the transfer of 

 ownership in return for access to the resource for a 

 limited period of time. Most of the Spanish and 

 Portuguese vessels will be deployed off Namibia and 

 Argentina as foreign-fiag vessels fishing with coastal 

 state licenses or as part of a joint venture 

 arrangement with companies in the coastal country. 



• Argentina - The EC initialed an agreement with 

 Argentina during December 1992. The agreement 

 was a major policy change for the Argentines who 

 had previously imposed restrictive conditions for 

 access.* The agreement will permit 70 EC vessels 

 to fish off Argentina under a variety of joint venture 

 arrangements. Most of these vessels will be Spanish. 

 The agreement has not yet been ratified by 

 Argentina.' 



• Namibia - The EC has not yet been able to 

 negotiate an access agreement with Namibia, although 

 it remains a high priority. Namibia has, to date, 

 rejected all EC offers to negotiate a fisheries 

 agreement. Namibia ended all foreign fishing in its 

 200-mile Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) when it 

 became independent in 1991. This affected 200 

 Spanish and 10 Portuguese vessels. Namibian 

 officials now report that the country's hake stocks are 

 recovering and that they hope to market this popular 

 fish in EC markets.'" They will require EC 

 concurrence to do so. It is likely that bilateral 

 fishery negotiations between the EC and Namibia will 

 resume in 1993 or 1994." It is unknown if all 210 

 EC vessels, which fished there before 1991, will be 

 able to return to Namibian waters. Those that caimot 

 will likely be sold, transferred to other non-fishing 

 operations, or scrapped. 



• Indian Ocean - The EC has negotiated a series of 

 agreements which provide access for EC tuna seiners 

 to Indian Ocean resources. This fleet may expand 

 especially if Italian vessels join this fleet. 



