Seafish promotes training to fishermen in two ways:

• we develop and maintain training courses and learning materials
• we provide grants for fishermen attending training
• we work with a network of Approved Training Providers who deliver our courses throughout the UK

The sea fishing industry has changed dramatically in the last few years. It is a multi-million pound industry where skippers and their crews work on modern, sophisticated vessels and are expected to be highly skilled technicians - able to act as efficient 'harvesters of the seas' and to operate a range of electronic instruments for safe navigation and for finding fish.

Fishing boats operate not only close to shore but also on distant fishing grounds as far afield as Greenland, Rockall, the North Atlantic and the Norwegian coast. For some jobs such as skipper or engineer, statutory qualifications - known as 'tickets' - issued by the Maritime and Coastguard Agency of the Department of Transport are required. The rules governing the issue of 'tickets' relate primarily to the size/power of the fishing vessel and its area of operation. Roughly speaking, the area of sea around the UK coast enclosed within latitudes 46^o 30' N and 62^o 00'N and bounded by longitude 12^o 00'W is regarded as the 'limited area'. Outside this boundary is the 'unlimited area'.

Did you know that...

• there are about 7,000 registered fishing vessels, providing over 14,000 full and part - time job opportunities throughout the UK.
• vessels range in size from less than seven metres in length fishing single-handed, to factory boats exceeding 50 metres in length and manned by crews of over 30.
• a typical 20 metre vessel will have a crew of five or six.
• most crew members are paid on a 'share' basis, in other words the greater the value of the catch landed the more money each crew member receives as a share of the total.