Top 10 stories that defined Europe’s 2014 seafood industry

2. Staying with mackerel, one of European seafood’s longest running, most bitter disputes — the so-called “mackerel war” in the NEA — came to an end on the eve of this year’s Global Seafood Expo in Brussels. Iceland’s mackerel quota for the year, while unilateral, fell well within the scope of the five-year agreement on catch shares that was agreed by the three other main NEA coastal states — the EU, Norway and the Faroe Islands — after almost five years of failed management negotiations. Accordingly, NEA mackerel was returned to the Marine Conservation Society (MCS) Fish to Eat list. For 2015, the EU, Faroes and Norway have agreed on a total catch limit of 1,054,000 MT, which includes a 15.6 percent reserve of 164,424 MT available to Iceland.