This release contains data on fish landings by: Irish vessels to Irish ports; Irish vessels to foreign ports; and foreign vessels to Irish ports.
The Sea Fisheries Protection Authority Statistics Unit is responsible for collating all sea-fisheries data particularly domestic and foreign landings by Irish vessels. Irish fishing vessels of 10 metres or longer are required to complete a logbook. Fishing vessels of less than 10 metres are not generally required to complete a fishing logbook so landing statistics are gathered using sales notes and gatherers documents.
Aquaculture and angling are not included in this release.
The CSO has made some changes to the value data received from the Sea Fisheries Protection Authority, particularly for 2012. The data published by the SFPA should be regarded as the definitive fish landings data for Ireland, see https://www.sfpa.ie/Data-Statistics/Reports/Annual-Statistics
The data were obtained by the CSO from the Sea Fisheries Protection Authority. Data at annual level were obtained for 2007 to 2019. Monthly data for landings by Irish vessels into Ireland were also received from the Sea Fisheries Protection Authority for 2003 to 2019 but the monthly data are not fully consistent with the annual data. The CSO has made some adjustments to the monthly species codes to improve the consistency between the annual and monthly data e.g. where the Sea-Fisheries Protection Authority had recoded the species during the processing of the data at annual level. Two tables have been included showing the monthly profile of catches for all landings by Irish vessels for 2010-2019 (Table 9A) and a second table showing the monthly distribution by species for 2019 (Table 9B).
The CSO previously published an annual fishery statistics release. Fish landings by Irish vessels covering the period 1990 to 2004 were included in these releases.
International Council for the Exploration of the Seas (ICES) standardise the division of sea areas for statistical analysis. Each ICES statistical rectangle is '30 min latitude by 1 degree longitude' in size which is approximately 30 nautical miles by 30 nautical miles. A number of rectangles are amalgamated to create ICES areas. The ICES areas have been further aggregated by the CSO to show meaningful areas for fish landings relating to Ireland.
The SFPA microdata included the name of the harbour that the fish were landed into. The CSO has grouped these together to show data for the main harbours in Ireland. Irish ports have also been aggregated at county level. Landings by Irish vessels into foreign ports have been aggregated to country level.
All data are subject to revision. There are mostly small differences between the official SFPA figures and those published in this release. If the causes of these differences are identified then the CSO will amend these figures as necessary e.g. estimation method for unusually low or high or missing unit values.
This release contains data for the main species landed. The microdata contain data at a more detailed level.
The quantity figures presented are in live weight equivalent. The landed weight may differ from the weight of the fish as it was taken from the sea due to the processing of the catch on board the vessel (e.g. gutting, filleting, etc). Conversion factors were applied to the landed weight by SFPA to calculate the live weight equivalent.
The name of the fishing vessel was included for most years in the data provided to the CSO by SFPA. However even in those years, the name of the vessel is not on all records. Hence no tables have been presented showing vessel characteristics (number, length, engine power, etc.).