25 Mar 2025
Two major new studies, both released today, have together demonstrated significant impacts of bottom trawling and demonstrate the feasibility of a transition away from trawling. Image description: Two trawling boats side by side at sea. Image by günter from Pixabay Trawling costs up to €11bn a year: Firstly, the study by National Geographic […]
19 Nov 2024
Friends of the Earth Germany, Bund für Umwelt- und Naturschutz Deutschland (BUND) filed a lawsuit against the German government to end bottom trawling, which is taking place in the Dogger Bank European Marine Protected Area. BUND – a member of Brussels-based marine NGO Seas At Risk, which is supporting the lawsuit – had already lodged an […]
08 Jul 2024
Nearly 9 in 10 citizens (86%) surveyed across seven EU countries expect their political leaders to prioritise the protection of marine biodiversity, according to the results of national polls conducted by Sapience. The study further identifies that, to protect the ocean, citizens consider safeguarding endangered marine species, marine habitats, and stopping overfishing to be essential or important […]
02 Jul 2024
In a debate on nature conservation on Thursday (28 June), Labour MP and Shadow Environment Minister Toby Perkins announced that he “will stop destructive bottom trawling that is destroying our ocean ecosystem”. This would be “one of our first measures” he said, if his party comes to power after the parliamentary elections. The Liberal Democrats […]
11 Jun 2024
Eight in ten adults in the UK (81%) feel that bottom-trawl fishing should be banned in marine protected areas (MPAs), according to new polling commissioned by the charity Oceana UK. Those in favour of banning bottom trawling in MPAs was shown in a sample of 2,111 UK adults, for polling commissioned by the charity, 566 […]
06 May 2024
To coincide with the Our Ocean conference, a new report, co-authored by Marine Conservation Society, Seas At Risk and Oceana, shows that in the seven countries analysed, 4.4 million hours of apparent bottom trawling was allowed in MPAs between 2015-2023 – equivalent to more than 500 years’ worth of trawling. Using data compiled by Global Fishing Watch, the breadth and […]
23 Apr 2024
Greece aims to be the ‘first in Europe’ to ban bottom trawling in marine protected areas as part of 21 initiatives worth 780 million euros. Greece has the longest Mediterranean coastline and plans to create two marine parks, one in the Ionian Sea and one in the Aegean Sea, along with efforts to tackle coastal […]
08 Jul 2023
By Jan Geert Hiddink, in The Conversation: You might remember newspaper articles in 2021 claiming that towing nets over the seabed to catch fish (known as bottom trawling) releases as much carbon as all flights taken each year. It turns out that the assessment behind this claim overestimated how much CO₂ is released in the process of bottom trawling […]
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