Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, if she will make an assessment of the potential merits of adopting an EU-style carding system to (a) warn and (b) sanction states that are not sufficiently tackling illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing.

The UK has retained the Illegal, Unreported and Unregulated (IUU) Fishing Regulation following its departure from the EU and continues to apply its provisions. While the UK has not formally adopted the EU’s carding system, it does enforce import bans on seafood from countries that have been red-carded by the EU, such as Cambodia, Comoros, and Saint Vincent and the Grenadines. Imports and landings from vessels listed on the UK’s IUU vessel list are also prohibited. Imports from yellow-carded countries are permitted to avoid unnecessary trade disruption because marking these countries as IUU offenders may undermine their efforts to improve compliance and address IUU fishing. The UK keeps issues related to IUU fishing and human rights abuses in seafood supply chains under active review, and we welcome robust evidence from stakeholders to inform future policy development.