Overview
- EU agriculture ministers meeting in Luxembourg kept a 2026 exception letting small German coastal fishers target limited herring with passive gear.
- For the western Baltic, herring and cod quotas remain unchanged from last year, plaice is cut by 3%, and sprat is increased by 45%.
- Member states set higher limits than the European Commission proposed, after Brussels sought to halve western herring and reduce western cod by 84% based on ICES advice.
- Bycatch quotas will stay the same next year, according to Denmark’s Jacob Jensen, while the multi‑year cod fishing ban across the Baltic continues.
- Environmental groups including WWF, BUND and Deutsche Umwelthilfe warned the 2026 limits endanger the Baltic ecosystem, as herring fishing remains more restricted in the west than in the central Baltic, Gulf of Riga and Bothnian Sea.