Many French fishermen have begun a two-day strike to highlight a “plague of crises” hitting their sector, including EU regulation and post-Brexit turmoil.
They are being called to walk out on Thursday (March 30) and Friday (March 31) to call for more government support.
Industry group le Comité national des pêches (CNP) says the journées mortes (dead days) in French ports would mean no fishing boats going out, no fish sales, and no processing of fish food items.
The CNP says each local committee can decide the best day or days to strike.
Some ports have already begun action and the movement is said to be well supported.
Workers at the French port of Boulogne-sur-Mer began action on Sunday evening, and fishing has been stopped since Tuesday, March 28. Demonstrations have also taken place in Rennes and Lorient.
The mayor of Boulogne, Frédéric Cuvillier, has also called for a “united front” at European level. He said that he was against EU regulations that would “put trades, traditions, economies and, ultimately, human heritage on the back burner”.
Unpopular EU regulations include the planned ban on seabed trawling in protected marine areas by 2030, and the Conseil d’Etat’s recent decision to ban fishing from some areas in the French Atlantic in a bid to protect dolphins in the Bay of Biscay. Instead, they are calling for the use of sonars and special dolphin-repelling nets to stop dolphins from becoming caught up in fishing.
The CNP said, in a statement to the AFP: “The floodgates are open. We have to give a future to all the actors of our sector because today the horizon is dark.” The sector condemned the government as being “disengaged” from the sea.
It added: “These ‘dead days’ are the result of ‘unified action’ and coordination between fishing workers, wholesalers, and fishmongers: because in the long term, the disappearance of a part of the fleet will directly threaten the entire employment pipeline, from the ports, right up to the processing plants.”
The movement is also calling for the payment of diesel subsidies, which protesters claim “have not been paid for six months”, and more unified rules on fishery and vessel safety rules in France, which are currently complex.