The Department of Environment, Food and Agriculture has today launched a consultation to gain views on a wide range of measure designed to sustainably manage the Queen Scallop fishery in the Manx Territorial Sea in 2014.
The consultation documents can be downloaded and the closing date for responses is Friday, 31 January 2014.
It is proposed to retain some of the measures used in 2013 including an increased Minimum Landing Size (MLS) of 55mm, a weekend ban on fishing and a curfew on fishing between 1800 and 0600 hours.
Proposed new measures include a move to managing the fishery via the Isle of Man Consolidated licence issued to permit fishing in the Territorial Sea. This measure would replace the use of emergency byelaws which are time consuming to produce. Licence variations can be quickly issued and can be used to change spatial and temporal closures, the gear type used for fishing or the quota allowed.
