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

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what information her Department holds on the number of assessed European fish stocks that are (a) fished at or below and (b) fished at higher than the maximum sustainable yield rate.

European Commission information suggests that in 2015, for stocks with full analytical assessments in the Atlantic EU waters, the North Sea and the Baltic Sea, (a) 32 stocks were being fished at or below the maximum sustainable yield (MSY) exploitation rate, and (b) 30 such stocks were being fished higher than the MSY exploitation rate.