By Emily Smith - 10th February 2004
The European Parliament on Tuesday voted through a proposal to save dolphins and porpoises from extinction.
The proposal, tabled by the European Commission last July, is intended to reduce the number of cetaceans (dolphins, whales and porpoises) that die in EU fishing nets.
Tuesday’s vote was welcomed by conservative MEP Neil Parish.
“These proposals are an important first step to protecting the dolphin and porpoise population," he said, adding that they could “save thousands of animals every year”.
But he supported a change to the original proposal, inserted by the parliament’s fisheries committee, calling for better long term measures.
To this end the new law will be reviewed in 2007.
“It is essential that alternative fishing methods be developed that remove the threat to dolphin and porpoises once and for all," he said.
“The European Commission must stop extensive consultation and monitoring processes and take real action to halt dolphin deaths.”
Animal welfare groups claim that, unless action is taken soon, dolphins and porpoises could die out altogether in certain waters.
According the international fund for animal welfare (IFAW) the small harbour porpoise in particular needs protecting.
IFAW claim that over ten thousand harbour porpoises are killed in EU waters every year.
“We and 1.8 million supporters welcome this proposal and the European Parliament’s vote as a first step towards protecting harbour porpoises and dolphins” said Lesley O’Donnell, IFAW's European director.
“It is a particular anomaly that the EU has banned driftnets in all other waters but not yet in the Baltic Sea, where scientists believe the accidental killing of just two porpoises might affect the future of the population.”
Parliament’s opinion in this case carries no legal clout but in this emotive, high profile and media friendly issue, EU governments who now have the final say on the measures are likely to give the MEPs' input serious consideration.
The proposal makes acoustic warning devices mandatory for ships in many parts of European seas and calls for the phasing out of drift nets in the Baltic Sea by 2007, bringing fishing boats in this area into line with those in the Atlantic and Mediterranean oceans.
Experts estimate that the average number of cetaceans killed in the world every year is at least 150 a day.
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