The Government intends to tackle the fuel crisis in the fishing industry through several initiatives in the forthcoming Budget.
A series of measures, including possible tax allowances, is being considered by a high-level group involving the Departments of Social, Community and Family Affairs, Marine and Natural Resources, Finance and the Taoiseach, according to the Minister for the Marine and Natural Resources, Mr Fahey.
The fishing industry was more severely hit than any other sector and could not sustain the current price of 34p a litre, he said. "There will be casualties if this continues, as crew are just walking off boats," the Minister said.
In a separate initiative, the Minister intends to devolve control of fishery harbours, which are currently run by his Department. E-commerce will have a role to play in this development, he said, when he spoke at a seminar in Furbo, Co Galway, hosted by Bord Iascaigh Mhara (BIM) on the role of electronic trading in the marine sector.
The Minister said he was committed to ensuring the seafood sector embraced e-commerce and its "undoubted benefits", and this was backed up by specific grant aid in the National Development Plan's fisheries development measure.
Responding to a report in yesterday's Irish Times on the EU's third-country fishing agreement for the £50 million supertrawler, Atlantic Dawn, the Minister said an EU licence was in place "and we are negotiating further expansion of that". The vessel is on the Irish mercantile marine register, and thus does not have an impact on total tonnage of the Irish fishing fleet.
Also speaking at the e-commerce seminar, Mr Crick Carlton of Nautilus Consultants said the application of sales on the Internet would involve branding Irish seafood for quality. The Irish fishing industry could not ignore the information technology and communications revolution, but was particularly poorly placed at present to benefit from the situation, he added.
