The fishermen of Charente-Maritime responded this Thursday, March 30 to the call of the National Committee for Maritime Fisheries and Marine Farming (CNPMEM) and participated in the “dead sector” operation from the ports of La Rochelle, La Cotinière – on the island of Oléron – or Royan. These professionals denounce pell-mell the price of fuel, the massive and unsuitable regulations or even the ban on bottom fishing in marine protected areas by 2030. They also contest the recent decision of the Council of State to impose the temporary closure of certain fishing areas in the Bay of Biscay in order to limit accidental captures of dolphins.
This Thursday, from 6 a.m. until midday, nearly 80 fishermen demonstrated their “anger” at the entrance to the Ile de Ré bridge, held a filter barrier and distributed leaflets. “We have nothing to lose. We don’t ask for money, we only ask to work,” explained Romuald Coutanceau, fisherman from La Rochelle and vice-president of the Departmental Fisheries Committee in Charente-Maritime.
At the start of the afternoon, these professionals went to La Rochelle and organized the “fishing funeral procession”. Their objective ? Go to the Old Port and the place where the NGO Sea Shepherd usually exposes the carcasses of cetaceans mutilated by fishing gear and found at sea or on the coast as part of its awareness-raising operations.
Owner of a boat less than 12 meters long, Yoann Crochet claims “never to have caught a dolphin in seventeen years in the business”. This Oleron fisherman says he is “discouraged” and wonders about the profitability of his business if fishing areas were to be closed for several months of the year in accordance with the expectations of the Council of State and scientific recommendations: “The artisanal units can no longer fish. But industrialists, who fish offshore, will not be affected! »
The fishermen have received support from the Charente-Maritime department, the main financier of the new port facilities and the La Cotinière fish auction, valued at more than 60 million euros. Sylvie Marcilly, the president of the department, thus denounced “the plan to ban trawling in marine protected areas” outlined by the European Commission on 27 February. “Simply unacceptable and untenable”, she estimated before adding this Thursday on Twitter: “By dint of imposing increasingly restrictive measures on the profession, it is the face of Charente artisanal fishing -maritime which risks being disfigured. “The “dead sector” operation must continue this Friday, March 31 in Charente-Maritime as elsewhere in France.