Aherdeen Fishery Statistics. 5 



the whole quantity of traivled fish in Aberdeen market, though the 

 quantities landed in August and September were trivial ; and that 

 from April to June these foreign trawlers were landing in each 

 month 40 per cent, and upwards of the whole quantity of trawled 

 tish in Aberdeen market. 



In the comparison of values, the percentage proportion does not 

 stand quite so high, owing to the low price on the average of Iceland 

 fisli. But even as it is, we see that the foreign fleet accounted for 

 over 20 per cent, of the w^hole money-value of treacled fish in 

 Aberdeen from January to September, fully 25 per cent, from 

 March to May, and as much as 30 per cent, in June 1914. 



Moreover, the catch of the foreign trawlers is not only a large 

 fraction of our total trawled catch, but it is also a very appreciable 

 fraction of the entire produce of our fisheries. 



Heie, taken from the Board's Eeport for 1914, we have the 

 figures for the whole country : — 



TABLE D. 



Total Quantity and Value of the Landings by Foreign Vessels 

 in all Scotland, compared with the Total Landings, 1914. 



We see, then, that though in the year 1914 the foreign landings 

 practically came to an end at the end of the month of July, and so 

 lasted only seven months of the year, nevertheless they accounted, 

 in quantity, for over 23 per cent, of the whole Scottish trawl catch, 

 for close on 18 per cent, of the whole Scottish supply of demersal 

 fish {i.e. of the whole produce of trawl and line combined), and of 

 nearly seven per cent, of the entire produce of the Scottish fisheries, 

 the great herring fishery now included. 



The question of whether it be to our advantage that these large 

 quantities of fish should be landed, and these large sums of money 

 taken away, by foreign fishermen, is not one which we need raise or 

 argue here. But it is at least plain that we had come to depend 

 upon the foreigner for a very considerable part of our supply, and 

 that the sudden stoppage of this large portion was one of the 

 difficulties which the market had to face, all of a sudden, upon the 

 outbreak of war. 



