>

Is bottom trawling currently allowed in protected areas...?
This seems like someone missed the point of "protecting".
Faster, EU. At that speed there won't be any biodiversity left by the time the ban comes into effect. >

What we need are mines that prevent bottom trawling. They could sit harmlessly just off the ocean floor, but if a trawler snags them they are triggered by pressure sensor just as they are hauled on board. Their presence in an area should be loudly declared to operators and insurance companies, as their purpose would be to make it too expensive to illegally fish an area. No people ever need to be actually harmed. >

That's a very expensive operation.  Any sort of electronics that has to sit on the ocean floor requires constant maintenance.
I would propose a simpler solution:
Issue letters of marque for illegal fishing. >

Becomes too easy to pirate legit ships. If there are no survivors there is no other side to the story. >

The 'legit' ships are screwing us over too.  What we need is a moratorium on all fishing so...I don't see this is a bad thing. >

This would incentivize shitty bad for the environment ships on the water. Anyone who could get their hands on a ship and some firepower, is how I see this turning out. Real unscrupulous types. How is this going to help again? >

Net reduction in fishing for cheaper than a global network of mines >

A lot more poluting ships on the ocean is bad news for fish. Increased piracy is bad news for all shipping services. The medicine seems worse than the disease. >

Ban it everywhere >

I wish they could too, but if they say it without being able to back it up with action, nobody would take them seriously anymore, like North Korea. >

They were providing NK as an example of something that isn’t taken seriously, not as a member of the EU. Re-read their comment.