GAP2 attends FITF steering group meeting

GAP2 colleagues Alan Steer and Steve Mackinson  attend a Fishing Into The Future (FITF) steering group meeting, contributing their expertise to discussions with HRH Prince of Wales. 

GAP2’s Alan Steer (a crab fisherman from Devon) and Steve Mackinson (CEFAS scientist and GAP2 coordinator) joined other members of the Fishing Into The Future (FITF) steering group at Dumfries House, Ayrshire on the 19th – 21st January to review progress since the last event, in Brixham (see here) and determine future directions for the project.


Encouraged by the work done already, and with continued support from Prince Charles, his International Sustainability Unit, Seafish and GMRI, there was great enthusiasm from the steering group to cement their shared vision of ‘charting a course towards sustainable UK fisheries’ by proposing the ‘Dumfries Agreement’, outlining the conditions for establishing and developing FITF as an entity.

Alan and Steve will join with other representatives from the UK fishing industry, science and policy in developing ideas for joint data collection and research initiatives. It was agreed that it will be vital to ensure that any work must establish appropriate ways to give access to any data collected, and provide fishermen with feedback from data analysis and its use.

Alan Steer commented: ‘I felt the third Fishing Into The Future steering group meeting continued the energy and forward thinking that came out of the Brixham workshop. A few members of the steering group gave presentations of our progress to HRH the Prince of Wales. He made comment on the fact that we had made such a united progression, and was also interested in our training and education break-out group. The two days of the meeting left me feeling inspired and reenergised’.

To find out more about the FITF steering group, click here.

 

 

 

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