Control on maritime fishingOur nation boasts a natural vocation for the activities tied to the sea such as fishing, with its history and traditions. But the living sea resources must be managed with attention, in the optic of assuring their availability for future generations, in order to guarantee a constant supportable development in the field. The sea must be protected from an excessive fishing effort, as well as from other negative impacts that originate from other human activities, in the way that its richness can be a heritage for all.
The Surveillance of fishing
The control on the ordinate going on of maritime fishery demands, in addition to a perfect knowledge of the community and national norms, also a knowledge of the connected norms (Navigational code, safety of navigation, regulations to the safeguard of the crews, hygienic-sanitary norms, discipline on commerce of fishing products, etc.). From this the legislator felt the need to entrust the co-ordination of these activities to the corps of the Capitanerie di Porto, a firmly established structure, widely spread over the more than 8000 km of coasts. In fact the art.21 of the Law n. 963 July 14 1965 regarding the maritime fishing discipline says expressively that the surveillance on fishing and on the commerce of fishing products and the check of the violations of the laws and regulations that regard them are entrusted to the Direction of the Commander of the Capitaneria di Porto, subject, this last, who also presides the local consultative Commission for maritime fishing. After the launching of the common politics on fishery the European Unions’ States have felt the necessity of individuating in every member State a qualified subject to which all predisposed control organisms must refer to, giving life, in this way, to the instituting of Centri di Controllo Pesca Nazionale (National Fishing Control Centers).
The National Fishing Control Centers (NFCC) has been instituted in realization to the EC Regulation 1489/97 of the Commission on 29/07/1997, containing the modalities of application of the EEC Regulation 2847/93 of the Council on satellite control systems of fishing boats.
Task of the NFCC, as prescribed by the DPR n. 424 October 9, 1998, is the surveillance on the fishing efforts and the connected economic activities. This activity is addressed to the fishing vessels flying the Italian flag (leaving out of consideration the waters in which they operate or in which port they call) and to the fishing units of member States, and even more to those of Nations that aren’t part of the European Union, when operating in community waters.
After all, Italy, with the above-mentioned DPR 424/98 has designated as control Authority the General Command of the Capitanerie di Porto and has pre-disposed at this aim structures, installations and informatics programs that allow, beginning from the new year, the radio-location in real time of the trawlers with a length superior of 18 meters through blue boxes (leaving the possibility to minor crafts of equipping themselves with this equipment).
In second place, in compliance with the fore-said Reg. (EEC) 2847/93 – which prescribes the co-ordination between the various Fishing Control Centers (FCC) of the European Union, through the programming of common inspections and the exchange of information on the acquired experiences – the General Command of the Corps of the Capitanerie di Porto is called to consolidate the already launched relations with the corresponding FCC of the Mediterranean, seated in France, Spain and Greece.
Another control on maritime fishingThe aim is, in fact, to acquire a widened knowledge of the fishing in the Mediterranean and the correlated activities, keeping in consideration that the FCC pre-posed control takes in the entire fishing activity (capture, transport, commercialisation and the financial aids to the enterprises through the carry-over aids). To this must be added the necessity of launching an exchange of information on the sea-control activity and on the unloading areas, in order to find a common strategy of contrast to illegal activities, also with the aim to anticipate, through the confrontation of the sanction norms of the member States that look upon the Mediterranean and to harmonise these norms, keeping in consideration that now the in-observance of the Community Regulations is pursued differently in the various Nations in line with the various sanctions (penal or administrative) and the relative afflictions.
As how much prefaces, its understandable that the tasks assigned to the General Command – and all the articulations of the Coast Guard – are arduous and demanding. The realization of the Community norms, in fact, demand human and material resources which will allow Italy to play a fundamental role in the Community’s fishing politics, in virtue of the Peninsula’s position in the heart of the Mediterranean.
To achieve these goals the General Command has carried out a series of initiatives aiming at the technical education of the operators that are to be employed by the Maritime Directions and the operational-room of Rome and, generally, the personnel.
Particularly, the study programs of the Institutes of Formation have been re-elaborated and enlarged, and courses held by Research centers of the field have been organized by the Maritime Directions and Flight Groups, as the Community norms largely come out of the results obtained from oceanographic campaigns. The themes of mastering, in fact, concern the principles of marine biology applied on fishing, as well as on the fundaments of Community right and the dynamic adapting of the Italian juridical system at the light of the jurisprudential orientation of the European Court of Justice and the Supreme Court and the goals pursued by the EEC Regulation 2847/93 and the other Community regulations (control measures and the rationalization of the fishing effort, the total of the allowed catch – TAC – regularity of the fishing operations in order of times, the vessels, the unloading and commercialization points of the products, and, particularly, the docketing of these products with the indication of freshness, weight, area of origin, of species and the type of production, or rather, if the ichthyic product has been caught in maritime waters, internal waters or from a stock-farm).
It must also be evidenced that the National Fishing Control Center – also in the light of the 6th National Plan of Fishing and Acquaculture related to the triennium 2000-2003 – has elaborated the Plan 2002, for the surveillance and the control on the fishing fleet. Indispensable instrument, this last, for carrying out the complex community norms and, particularly, the (EEC) Regulation 2847/93. The fore-said regulation prescribes the modalities of the carrying out of controls in the field of fishing which subsist in on board visits, check of the regular holding of fishing registers, communications of the unloading of the fishing, regular holding of the sale notes and – not lastly – the respecting of the sanitary norms (cf. Legislative Decree 531/92).
In the end the intense activity of surveillance and control, carried out by the Corps in sea and in the places of commercialization of the products, after the institution of the National Fishing Control Center, is worth of mentioning. The achieved results, also thanks to the constant activity of sensitization carried out by the Peripheral Offices by the interested maritime order, have been brilliant, especially considering the other exacting institutional services that the Corps of the Capitanerie must carry out.
Therefore, subsists the certainty that in future the Corps will spend the best energies and its own enthusiasm on complying with the community duties, improving the already flattering results of which every military of the corps should go proud of.
