Fish landings by Irish vessels in Ireland and foreign ports decreased by 5% between 2020 and 2021 from 217,981 tonnes to 206,068 tonnes, according to new figures from the Central Statistics Office.
Fish landings by foreign vessels in Ireland decreased by 14% or 19,538 tonnes in 2021.
In 2021, the species with the highest quantity landed by Irish vessels in Ireland was Atlantic Mackerel at 51,476 tonnes.
The value of the Atlantic Mackeral landed is put at €60m.
Killybegs had the highest quantity of fish landings in 2021 accounting for 55% of all landings by Irish vessels.
Two-thirds of landings happened between January and April and more than half of fish landings took place in Killybegs, Co Donegal.
In Ireland, landings were down 3% or 6,259 tonnes and landings by Irish trawlers in foreign ports declined 19% or 5,655 tonnes.
Some 55% of fish landed by Irish vessels was landed in Killybegs, Co Donegal, amounting to 11,4000 tonnes.
An additional 90,000 tonnes of fish were landed in the port by foreign vessels, making it the leading fishing port in Ireland by some distance.
In terms of tonnes landed by Irish vessels the busiest months were January to April and September to November. In 2021 approximately 66% of the catch landed by Irish vessels was between January and April.
There was greater variability at the species level e.g. 70% of landings by Irish vessels of Blue Whiting in 2021 took place in March and 58% of landings by Irish vessels of Atlantic Mackerel occurred in January 2021.