EU fisheries partnership agreements with third countries

The EU started to seek fisheries agreements with third countries after the adoption of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (1982). The first such agreement with Mauritania was concluded in 1987, with successive agreements part of a broader development and cooperation framework.
Successive reforms of the Common Fisheries Policy have led to a new generation of Fisheries Partnership Agreements (FPAs), which encourage the development of sustainable fisheries management in third countries, while providing access to EU fleets. The current EU-Mauritania FPA is the most important fisheries agreement both in terms of volume and financial contribution (€70 million per year).
Fishing opportunities (i.e. catch volume/ number of licences) have been reduced in absolute value for most categories, and cephalopods (octopus and squid) have been excluded from the protocol. However, direct comparison with the previous protocol is difficult, since fishing opportunities were expressed in gross tonnage (based on the capacity of fishing vessels ), whereas the new protocol allocates fishing opportunities in tonnes of actual catch . The protocol also includes a requirement to fish over 20 nautical miles off Mauritania’s coastline, rather than 13 nautical miles as in the previous agreement.