The 15 ministers agreed to 2004 quotas for all fish species, freezing the numbers for cod and hake at last year's levels while nearly doubling the amount of haddock that fishermen are allowed to catch.

Cod and hake are two of the region's most endangered species, and scientists say cod numbers in the North Sea have fallen to one-tenth of 1970 levels. They point to the waters off eastern Canada, where cod disappeared in the 1990s after years of overfishing.

EU Fisheries Commissioner Franz Fischler praised today's agreement. "We have got a fishing policy which offers the chance of long-term recovery as well as agreeing [to] the immediate fishing needs for next year," he said (London Guardian, Dec. 19). "The long-term aim is to keep fishing and if there are no fish, we cannot do that."

Germany and Sweden had called for deeper cuts in cod catches, but Spain, Denmark, France and the United Kingdom had argued against new restrictions that they said could hurt fishing communities.

European fishing industry officials said 200,000 people could be deeply affected by the new regulations (Raf Casert, Associated Press/Environmental News Network, Dec. 19). Under today's agreement, fishermen who are able to show that they catch little or no cod will be allowed more days to fish (BBC Online, Dec. 19).

Copyright, National Journal Group, 2003