SeafoodSPAIN is officially Europe’s largest exporter of seafood.

A massive 157,000 tonnes of canned and prepared seafood was shipped out of Spain in 2014, leaving other European exporters far behind.

Spain’s fishing industry – which employs 25,000 workers – is worth approximately €4.5 billion according to the National Association of Canned Fish and Shellfish.

Canned tuna accounts for a massive 67% of the total exports, with squid and cuttlefish making up a combined 16% of the industry.

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12 COMMENTS

  1. They have always been looters. The rias in Galicia were still full of fish only 30 years ago. I remember meeting a Galician who emigrated to Australia and had returned for a vacation after 30 years he could’nt believe there were no more fish.

    Cornish fishermen sold their licences to the Spanish and now there are no more mackeral, all fished out. I can well remember at the end of every summer the sea would turn molten silver with bug shoals coming right in near the beaches in Hove and local fishermen would turn up with nets and catch a small part of the shoal which they immediately sold to the women sunbathing with their children, that’s what you call fresh fish. Year after year this pattern was repeated – gone forever because of mindless greed.
    If we can see past our selfishness there should be a moratorium on eating fish in Europe. Just look at where the fish in supermarkets come from – Alaska/the Pacific/South china seas/West Africa.

  2. Rick Stein has mentioned the massive exporting of British fish to Spain & France. Pity they can’t just fish in their “own back yards” but of course, they don’t. They’re screwed & sadly from what Stuart has to say, they’re doing their best to screw up Cornish waters as well. Like Stuart, I can recall fishing for mackerel off Cornwall. How sad to hear those days have basically gone. Unless something is done i.e. enforcement of quotas instead of paying them “lip-Service”, can we expect UK waters to be “fished out” like the Mediterranean off Spanish waters? The Med off Spain at least, used to be full of fishing boats not too many year ago especially during the evenings. In fact it was virtually a tourist sight to see. Nowadays, they’re few & far between quite probably because there’s little to catch. Now it seems the UK (who complies with rules) are suffering to a large extent because other haven’t & don’t.

  3. Dan: You’ve just visited two islands currently being swamped by desperate immigrants, driven on to the ocean by the behaviour of greedy, murderous criminals. Nothing to do with over-breeding in that particular case.
    Re-distribution is the uncomfortable, global answer, accompanied by sexual education on contraception, freed from religious shackles.
    The science on reliable birth-control is relatively new and still developing, when it becomes universally available along with fair shares, the problem you point to, will solve itself. Until then, murder and mayhem will serve as the world’s condom, even though there are enough resources to actually care for all the people on the planet right now.

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