Small Scale Coastal Fisheries Scheme

This scheme is designed to be a ‘one stop shop’ for Small Scale Coastal Fishers, allowing both onshore and onboard investments by Small scale coastal fishing (SSCF*) vessel owners, with the following objectives:

• Selective Fishing: Investment in equipment to Improve size or species selectivity of fishing gear to avoid and reduce unwanted catches in accordance with Article 15 of Regulation (EU) 1380/2013.
• Energy Efficiency: Investments in equipment aimed at reducing the emission of pollutants or greenhouse gases and increasing the energy efficiency of fishing vessels, and onshore operations. Energy efficiency audits.
• Hygiene, Health, and Safety: Investments on board that improve hygiene, health, safety and working conditions provided and that exceed legislative requirements.
• Quality: Innovative investments that improve the quality of fishery products or add value to fishery products, by allowing fishermen to carry out the processing of these catches.
• Traceability: The costs of purchase and installation on board of the components, including computer hardware and software, which are necessary to ensure the traceability of fishery products.

* SSCF: Owners of vessels <12.00m overall length (LOA) and which do not fish towed gears.

Who is Eligible

Owners of SSCF fishing vessels:

• which must be registered on the Irish Fleet Register at the time of grant application, and;
• who must have carried out fishing activities for more than 60 days in the two calendar years preceding the year of submission of the application. This will be cross-checked with SFPA.

Amounts Granted

The support rate under this scheme is 80%.