The cod and haddock are much smaller than they used to be - a five-year-old haddock on average weighs half as much as in the boom years before the fishing moratorium was imposed nearly 20 years ago.

BBC: Nature's spring: Cod bounce back

There is, of course, an irony that, while fishing authorities in Brussels openly declare their support for a moratorium on bluefin fishing in the Mediterranean, their rules continue to allow tuna to be caught by boats which were constructed with the help of public subsidies and processed in factories built, similarly, with EU financial aid.

BBC: The bitter battle over bluefin tuna

In addition to calling for a 50 percent reduction in the capacity of the industrial fishing fleet, Greenpeace seeks the elimination of government subsidies and a moratorium on the construction of large fishing vessels.

CNN: Greenpeace: Industrial fishing fleet should be halved

Conservation groups, and many scientists, have been calling for a complete moratorium on bluefin fishing for some time, but have been roundly ignored.

ECONOMIST: Tuna fishing