Simrishamn: Fisheries ministers will settle the Baltic quotas for 2027 at their Council meeting on 26 and 27 October 2026, working from a Commission proposal that raises pelagic catch limits sharply while keeping cod close to shut. The Commission adopted the text on 24 August 2026, covering the ten stocks the Union manages in the sea.

The split between herring and cod defines the package. Central Baltic herring would gain 49 percent, sprat 44 percent, Gulf of Riga herring 11 percent and Bothnian herring three percent. Plaice, Main Basin salmon and Gulf of Finland salmon would hold steady.

Cod moves the other way. The by-catch allowance for western Baltic cod falls 88 percent and eastern Baltic cod 51 percent. Western Baltic herring drops 45 percent, the one pelagic stock left out of the general recovery.

"Scientists tell us that for certain pelagic fish stocks in the Baltic Sea the outlook for 2027 is better. This gives us hope that our careful approach over the past few years is starting to pay off and we need to continue the rebuilding trajectory we jointly agreed upon," said Costas Kadis, Commissioner for Fisheries and Oceans.

Kadis paired that optimism with a warning about the sea itself. Oxygen depletion, nutrient run-off and warming water have reshaped the Baltic food web, and fisheries managers cannot fix those through catch limits alone.

Swedish, Danish and German coastal fleets read the cod figures as confirmation that directed fishing will not return this decade. Directed cod fishing in the western Baltic closed years ago, and the remaining allowance exists only so that boats targeting flatfish do not break the law when cod enters the net.

Pelagic operators in Finland, Estonia and Latvia take a different view. A 49 percent rise in central Baltic herring restores volume to a fleet that absorbed repeated cuts, and the sprat increase gives feed and fishmeal processors around the Gulf of Bothnia something to plan against.

• Proposal adopted 24 August 2026, covering ten EU-managed stocks
• Council political agreement expected 26 and 27 October 2026
• Formal adoption follows in November 2026
• Central Baltic herring up 49 percent, western Baltic cod by-catch down 88 percent

Environmental groups argue the Commission read the science too generously. They point out that the International Council for the Exploration of the Sea advises on single stocks while the Baltic operates as one strained system, and that lifting pressure on herring and sprat removes food from the cod the Union says it wants to rebuild.

The Council rarely accepts a Commission proposal unchanged. Ministers have historically pushed total allowable catches above the scientific advice, and this file carries the added complication that eight member states border the sea and each arrives with a different fleet profile. The Commission press release setting out the proposal frames the numbers as the maximum sustainable yield approach applied stock by stock.

Baltic quotas follow an annual cycle that begins with scientific advice in May, moves to a Commission proposal in August and ends with a ministerial deal in October. The sea gets its own negotiation because it is enclosed, shallow and shared entirely by EU members apart from Russia, which sits outside the process. Atlantic and North Sea limits run on a December timetable and involve the United Kingdom, Norway and wider coastal state talks.

Eastern Baltic cod collapsed after 2015 and has never recovered. Scientists blame a mix of hypoxic dead zones, seal predation, parasite load and thin fish that never reach spawning weight. Nothing in the 2027 Baltic quotas changes that trajectory, and ministers in October will be deciding how fast herring boats can grow inside a sea whose flagship stock remains functionally gone.