Fisheries Control Regulation

Digital Traceability for Fish and Seafood Supply Chains

The EU Fisheries Control Regulation makes digital lot-level traceability mandatory from January 2026. Paper records and PDFs no longer comply.

Keep your traceability chain intact from catch to shelf with osapiens ftrace, trusted by more than 770 enterprises across fish and seafood supply chains.

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Next deadline:

January 10, 2026: mandatory digital lot-level traceability for fish and seafood is already in force. If your traceability data still moves on paper, you are non-compliant now.

Regulation timeline

2008

EU IUU Regulation

Regulation (EC) No 1005/2008 establishes the catch certification scheme to combat illegal, unreported, and unregulated (IUU) fishing. Catch documents must accompany all fishery product imports into the EU to confirm legal origin.

2012

ftrace founded

GS1 Germany establishes ftrace, together with major retailers and leading seafood suppliers. Built on GS1 and EPCIS standards, the platform delivers batch-level, event-based traceability for fish and seafood supply chains.

10. January 2026

Mandatory digital traceability in froce

Digital lot-level traceability becomes mandatory for fresh, frozen, and lightly processed seafood (CN 03). The EU CATCH system becomes mandatory for fishery imports. Catch certificates issued before this date remain valid until January 10, 2028.

10. January 2029

Scope extended

Two additional product categories fall under the regulation's traceability requirements: Prepared or preserved fish, including caviar (CN 1604), and prepared or preserved crustaceans, molluscs, and other aquatic invertebrates (CN 1605).

2009

EU Fisheries Control System

Council Regulation (EC) No 1224/2009 establishes the EU Fisheries Control System, introducing traceability requirements for fishery and aquaculture products, including lot marking and information transmission obligations.

2023

EU Fisheries Control Regulation revised, osapiens aquires ftrace

Regulation (EU) 2023/2842 revises the EU Fisheries Control Regulation, introducing mandatory digital lot-level traceability across the supply chain. osapiens acquires ftrace and integrates it into the osapiens HUB.

10. January 2028

CATCH mandatory for all certificates

Transition period ends. All catch certificates must be issued and processed through EU CATCH, regardless of issuance date.

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2008

2008
EU IUU Regulation

Regulation (EC) No 1005/2008 establishes the catch certification scheme to combat illegal, unreported, and unregulated (IUU) fishing. Catch documents must accompany all fishery product imports into the EU to confirm legal origin.
2009

2009
EU Fisheries Control System

Council Regulation (EC) No 1224/2009 establishes the EU Fisheries Control System, introducing traceability requirements for fishery and aquaculture products, including lot marking and information transmission obligations.
2012

2012
ftrace founded

GS1 Germany establishes ftrace, together with major retailers and leading seafood suppliers. Built on GS1 and EPCIS standards, the platform delivers batch-level, event-based traceability for fish and seafood supply chains.
2023

2023
EU Fisheries Control Regulation revised, osapiens aquires ftrace

Regulation (EU) 2023/2842 revises the EU Fisheries Control Regulation, introducing mandatory digital lot-level traceability across the supply chain. osapiens acquires ftrace and integrates it into the osapiens HUB.
2026

10. January 2026
Mandatory digital traceability in froce

Digital lot-level traceability becomes mandatory for fresh, frozen, and lightly processed seafood (CN 03). The EU CATCH system becomes mandatory for fishery imports. Catch certificates issued before this date remain valid until January 10, 2028.
2028

10. January 2028
CATCH mandatory for all certificates

Transition period ends. All catch certificates must be issued and processed through EU CATCH, regardless of issuance date.
2029

10. January 2029
Scope extended

Two additional product categories fall under the regulation's traceability requirements: Prepared or preserved fish, including caviar (CN 1604), and prepared or preserved crustaceans, molluscs, and other aquatic invertebrates (CN 1605).

What the regulation requires

Regulation (EU) 2023/2842 amends Council Regulation (EC) No 1224/2009, modernizing the EU's rules for monitoring, controlling, and enforcing compliance in fisheries. From January 10, 2026, all operators handling fish and seafood covered by Chapter 3 of the Combined Nomenclature must record a minimum traceability data set at lot level and make it available digitally to downstream partners and to competent authorities on request.

Where traceability breaks down

The catch-to-retail chain breaks at processing.

Filleting, portioning, blending, and repackaging are all points where paper systems lose the link between catch origin and finished product. By the time a fillet reaches the retailer, the origin data recorded at the fishing vessel is lost.

Catch origin data is fragmented across vessels, flag states, and ports.

A processor sourcing fish from multiple vessels or third-country exporters receives catch data in different formats, through different channels, and at different levels of completeness. Species, catch area, gear type, vessel identifier, and quota area are all required fields, yet none of this arrives in a single structured digital record.

Every customer and authority requests traceability data differently.

Wholesalers supplying multiple retail chains and HoReCa customers receive traceability requests in different formats, through different portals, with different field requirements per partner. Each request triggers a separate preparation exercise, and the resulting inconsistency creates audit risk.

Recall response time is measured in hours.

A food safety authority issuing a recall notice expects operators to identify every affected lot and every downstream customer within hours. Without a digital record of every transformation step, tracing a catch lot through to finished product and every downstream shipment is not possible in that timeframe.

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