2023-09-22 09:42:00
Gathered for their meeting in Nice, fishermen fear the end of their industry with the disappearance of state aid for diesel.
By HR with AFP Anger is once again palpable among fishermen (image of the “dead industry” demonstration in March 2023). © ROMUALD AUGE / MAXPPP / PHOTOPQR/SUD OUEST/MAXPPP Published on 09/22/2023 at 9:42 a.m.
The fishermen’s meeting began this Thursday, September 21 in Nice in a very tense context. Many professionals in the sector fear new difficulties after the government’s decision to end aid for diesel. This measure is experienced as a betrayal and a cataclysm by some fishermen.
“This sector is at the end of its life. The support is not up to par,” insisted from the podium the president of the National Fisheries Committee, Olivier Le Nezet, calling on the Secretary of State for the Sea, Hervé Berville, to “take responsibility for a cataclysm which will be the end of the French fishing industry”. Hervé Berville is expected this Friday morning in Nice. Last Saturday, he confirmed that cash flow aid of 20 cents (excluding tax) per liter of diesel would stop on October 15.
75 million expenses
The measures, renewed several times for a total amount of 75 million euros, were taken in March 2022 to help fishermen cope with the surge in the price of diesel after the Russian invasion of Ukraine. On Wednesday, the main organizations representing the fishing sector denounced the “disengagement” of the State, recalling the succession of crises suffered by fishermen, from Covid to this surge in energy costs, including Brexit.
“We are in the process of erasing France’s maritime identity with the wave of the hand. We are here to feed the population. We have to stop making fun of the world,” stormed the chairman of the committee. “In agriculture, we are capable, when there is a pork crisis, of putting 270 million euros on the table. And we are not capable of putting 50 or 60 million into an entire sector (fishing)? » he grumbled.
However, “there are solutions”, assured Olivier Le Nezet, judging that it was up to the State to “take its responsibilities”. The chairman of the committee criticizes the government for not having sufficiently pleaded the cause of fishermen in Brussels, in particular to obtain an increase in the fuel aid ceiling.
“A provocation”
Hervé Berville explained on Wednesday that he could no longer extend them “because the European regime which allowed this aid ends this year”. “It is not up to the State to always replace the responsibility of all the players in the sector,” he also said in an interview with West France and TV-Rennes.
A statement perceived as “a provocation” by professionals. “We are caught between the price of diesel and the price of fish, which is very low,” testified Christophe Collin, director of Armement Bigouden in Guilvinec (Finistère), which has already sent two of its nine ships to broken after Brexit.
Last week, a boat returned to port with 43,000 euros worth of fish for an exorbitant expense of 23,000 euros worth of diesel, he said. “The fishermen are paid by the share. We count the sales, we deduct the charges and we share the rest: two shares for the fishing skipper, one for each sailor,” Stéphane Le Doaré, LR president of the community of communes of the Pays, explained to AFP. bigouden south (Finistère).
“At 70 cents per liter, we balance; at 90 cents, we have not left the port and we have already lost money,” he added. The French fleet, third in the European Union behind Spain and Denmark with some 6,500 ships, has shrunk by more than a quarter in twenty years. Its weapons are aging, like its sailors, almost half of whom will retire within five to ten years.
The succession of crises has further weakened it: at least 90 vessels (including 45 in Brittany) should be scrapped as part of a post-Brexit individual support plan intended for fishermen who no longer have access to British waters. . Over the course of the round tables, exasperation grew. The absence of the Secretary of State for the Sea is highlighted. That of the Director General of Maritime Affairs at a round table is not well received.
“I see empty chairs in front, I find it pitiful,” said Bernard Pérez, president of the Occitanie fisheries committee, on the podium. “We need the word of the State,” he added. Does he want to keep a fishing industry? Whether he tells us yes or no, but we have to hear him. »
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