Original version

BBC Radio 4 FM

BBC Radio 4 is a radio channel that started transmitting on the 30th September 1967. It replaced BBC Home Service.

BBC Radio 4

Radio 4

Radio 4 (FM)

On Your Farm

Magazines & Reviews

Factual: Science & Nature: Nature & Environment

Getting to the heart of country life with a look at individual farming endeavours

BBC Radio 4 LW

On Your Farm: 08/01/2012

08/01/2012

BBC Radio 4 - On Your Farm, 08/01/2012

Reporting from Fraserburgh on the mackerel wars being fought in Scottish ports.

Mackerel is Scotland's most valuable catch and its worth to the nation has fuelled a bitter dispute with Iceland and the Faroe Islands. On Your Farm visits Fraserburgh and Buckie.

Mackerel, once considered one of the lowliest fish and derided as a scavenger of the seas, is now Scotland's most valuable catch. It's also its most contentious, lying at the heart of a long-running international dispute. In 2008 when Iceland and the Faroe Islands declared their own quotas for mackerel, allowing themselves far more than had ever previously been agreed, a war of words - and sometimes even of direct action - broke out.
Scotland is the heartland of Britain's mackerel fleet, with twenty five trawlers, based mainly in Fraserburgh, Peterhead and Shetland. Fishing has long been crucial to the survival of towns like Fraserburgh, so to what extent could this dispute threaten the future of an already fragile economy? And do local sympathies lie with the mackerel fishermen, or has the decline of fishing and the rise of the oil industry destroyed the traditional allegiances? 
Presented and produced by Moira Hickey.

Intelligent speech, the most insightful journalism, the wittiest comedy, the most fascinating features and the most compelling drama and readings anywhere in UK radio.

Accessibility links

Programme Index

On Your Farm

08/01/2012

Genres

Formats

Brand

BBC Radio 4 FM

About BBC Radio 4