Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 20 January 2026
791. Deputy Pádraig Mac Lochlainn asked the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine the percentage of all European Union fish stocks that was caught in the Irish EEZ under the Common Fisheries Policy, in each of the years 2005 to 2025. [3497/26]
View answerUnder the Common Fisheries Policy (CFP), official landing statistics are reported by Member States by ICES division, rather than by Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ), and most ICES divisions straddle more than one EEZ area. Landings are also reported by statistical rectangles - these are the smallest spatial unit by which catches are reported (approx. 36 x 30 nautical miles in size).
In order to estimate the landings from the Irish EEZ, the best available method is to sum the data by statistical rectangle for all of these units in the Irish EEZ. For rectangles that fall partially inside the EEZ, the landings inside the EEZ are assumed to be proportional to the spatial area of the rectangle that lies inside the EEZ.
In 2022, my Department - working with the Marine Institute (MI) and Sea Fisheries Protection Authority (SFPA) - published a Fact sheet setting out the landings volume (in tonnes) and value (in millions of Euro) for the main quota and non-quota species caught in the Irish EEZ for the period from 2016 to 2020 (copy attached). [<ahref="https:/data.oireachtas.ie/ie/oireachtas/debates/questions/supportingDocumentation/2026-01-20_pq791-20-01-2026_en.pdf">PQanswer</a>]
I have asked my Department to work with the Marine Institute and SFPA to compile the data for the additional years requested by the Deputy.
