Linnéa Engström, author. – Madam President, traceability of fish products is a major issue for the Committee on Fisheries. The new common fisheries policy has very rigorous requirements in terms of marketing and traceability of fish and aquaculture products.

The legislator defined both mandatory information and voluntary information for consumers, making information a crucial point of the legislation.

Compulsory information is the following: the commercial designation of a species and its scientific name, the production method and fishing gear, the area where the product was caught or produced and a clear indication whether the product was defrosted.

This mandatory information applies to both retail and supply for caterers and restaurants. It is critical that consumers have access to complete information in order to make an informed choice. Restaurants must always keep the information which they received when they bought the product in case consumers or state authorities ask for them.

The resolution of the Committee on Fisheries discusses the Commission survey for control of 2015, which analyses the conformity of labelling with the legal requirements of white fish in retail. This sampling survey indicates that the species indicated on the label was correct in 94% of cases.

However, numbers are worrying for some species, for which the level of conformity is very low: common species are substituted for more expensive species. This is often the case for bluefin tuna. In a separate study from last year on labelling in restaurants in Brussels, including the EU canteens, the NGO Oceana estimates mislabelling at 32% overall, with a mislabelling rate in bluefin tuna to be 80%.

This observation brings us to ask Member States to enforce the existing law. Compulsory and correct information must be available for consumers all the way through the chain, including diners in restaurants. It is the duty of Member States to guarantee that this information is available and accurate.

Member States must implement sanctions which are efficient, proportionate and dissuasive. First and foremost, Member States have to reinforce controls in order to identify fraud and the missing links in the supply chain for fishery and aquaculture products which lead to mislabelling or fraud.

Further information on fish can be added to a label as an addition to compulsory information. This information can enable consumers to have complementary information such as the date of catch, date of landing, more information on fishing gear, the flag state, information on the nutritional value of the product or environmental, ethical or social information.

Unfortunately, voluntary information can sometimes be difficult for consumers to interpret because of its diversity. It is also necessary that such information be reliable, meaning it must be controlled in a very strict manner.

The Commission is currently working on the implementation of a pilot project proposed by Parliament last year – and my regards to our chair, Mr Cadec, who could not be here today. It deals with voluntary information on fishery products and aims at creating an up—to—date and exhaustive inventory of voluntary claims associated with fishery and aquaculture products, which are marketed in the European Union, whatever their origin. This inventory will enable an analysis of the certification systems of these claims.

It could help in the creation of an external structure which scrutinises the certification of voluntary claims included on the label of fishery and aquaculture products. We are awaiting this external structure and hope that this information will be easily accessible to consumers.

I would also like to remind the Commission that Parliament is still awaiting the Commission report on the possibility to define and establish minimum criteria for the creation of an EU ecolabel for fishery and aquaculture products. The publication of this report is a requirement of the common market organisation for fishery and aquaculture regulation.

I would like to finish by asking all Member States to strengthen controls, because European consumers have a right to know what ends up on their plate.