"Operation" Sardinelle ", a fishery surveillance operation in which Member States of the Sub-regional Fisheries Commission (SRFC) cooperated to detect Illegal, Unregulated and Unreported (IUU) fishing, took place from 23 to 26 January 2020.
The European Maritime Safety Agency (EMSA) has been closely cooperating with the European Fisheries Control Agency (EFCA) to support enhanced fisheries control by providing additional surveillance capacity from a remotely piloted aircraft system (RPAS). EMSA has made available a quadcopter for flights taking off from EFCA’s chartered offshore patrol vessel, the Lundy Sentinel, and operating over areas of interest in the Mediterranean Sea, western waters of the North-East Atlantic Ocean, North Sea and Baltic Sea.
The European Fisheries Control Agency (EFCA) in cooperation with the Member States Control Expert Groups (CEGs) has carried out an evaluation of compliance with the Landing Obligation (LO) in selected fisheries in the North Sea and North Western Waters. The evaluation was performed over the period 2015-2017 for mackerel fisheries and over 2016-2017 for North Sea fisheries targeting cod, plaice and sole and for North-western waters fisheries targeting haddock, hake and whiting.
More than 90 delegates from the European Coast Guard Functions Forum (ECGFF) gathered in Venice for the plenary sessions of the Heads of Coast Guard Functions Organisations.
The European Fisheries Control Agency (EFCA) Administrative Boar, in its 33th meeting held on 22 October in Vigo (Spain), has adopted the Single Programming Document (SPD) for 2020-2024, comprising of a complete overview of the resources allocated to the Agency in accordance with planned objectives, indicators and deliverables for the coming years. The budget for 2020 is of EUR 17.6 million, subject to the adoption of the European Union (EU) budgetary authority.
European law enforcement and fisheries control authorities have enhanced their cooperation in combating illegal fishing activities following the organisation of a Joint Action Day (JAD) on 25 September, in the framework of EMPACT (European Multidisciplinary Platform against Criminal Threats). The leader of this particular JAD was Portugal with EFCA as co-leader, teaming up EU Agencies (Europol, Eurojust and Frontex) and Member States Cyprus, Croatia, Estonia, Latvia, Malta, Italy, Portugal, Spain, law enforcement and fisheries control communities.
From 2 to 4 October 2019 in Praia, Cape Verde, officials from the Fisheries Monitoring Centres (FMCs) of Cape Verde and Guinea-Bissau have participated in a workshop which overall objective was to strengthen the knowledge and usability of vessel monitoring systems (VMS), Automatic Identification Systems (AIS) and other control technologies such as satellite imagery.
Twenty fisheries inspectors from Nigeria have participated in the training session from 2 to 4 October 2019 provided by experts from the European Fisheries Control Agency (EFCA) and the Fisheries Committee for the West Central Gulf of Guinea (FCWC) with the support of national trainers, in the framework of the EU funded project PESCAO.
On 25 September, a Joint Action Day (JAD), part of a large scale JAD concept, has taken place in the framework of EMPACT (European Multidisciplinary Platform against Criminal Threats), to coordinate specifically the Operational Action (OA) on Illegal Fishing. The leader of the OA is Portugal, EFCA is co-leader and the OA is teaming up EU Agencies (Europol, Eurojust and Frontex) and Member States Estonia, Greece, Spain, France, Croatia, Italia, Malta, Romania law enforcement and fisheries control communities as well as Interpol.
For three days, from 18 to 20 September 2019, twenty fisheries inspectors from the Republic of The Gambia were instructed in control techniques at sea and at landing by trainers from the European Fisheries Control Agency (EFCA).