European Union and the United Kingdom - fisheries consultations: written record 2024

Inter-annual quota flexibility

a) Underlining the need for flexibility in quota management, the Parties agreed that inter-annual flexibility can increase the effectiveness of fisheries management, whereby certain quota shares can be carried forward to, or borrowed from, the following management period. They therefore notified the following arrangements for 2024 to 2025:

i. Each Party may transfer to the following year unutilised quantities of up to 10% of its quota of a particular TAC. The quantity carried forward can then be used in addition to that Party’s quota in the following year. Quota transferred in this way cannot be carried forward to subsequent years. This year-to-year flexibility does not apply to the bilaterally shared stocks and biologically related consultative TACs that have been issued zero catch advice by ICES. These are listed in Annex 2, where no such flexibility will be available.

ii. Each Party may authorise fishing by vessels of up to 10% beyond its quota of a particular TAC. All quantities fished beyond its quota for the year will be deducted from the Party’s quota for the following year. This year-to-year flexibility does not apply to the bilaterally shared stocks and biologically related consultative TACs that have been issued zero catch advice by ICES. These are listed in Annex 2, where no such flexibility will be available.

iii. For the avoidance of doubt, where a TAC is split into constituent parts, the arrangements in this paragraph can only be applied to each part separately and not across the whole TAC (e.g. North Sea sandeels).

iv. The Delegations exchanged complete catch statistics and quotas for 2022. The Parties agreed to arrange for complete catch statistics and quotas for 2023 to be made available to the other Party via the SCF.

v. These arrangements apply to all the eligible stocks listed in Annexes 35 and 36 to the TCA. However, if other international arrangements or obligations are put in place which conflict with these arrangements, those other arrangements and obligations will prevail.

b) The Parties agreed that further discussions on this matter could take place via the SCF.

London (6 December 2023),

For the United Kingdom

Brussels (6 December 2023),

For the European Union