The Sustainable Eel Group welcomes the recent edition of BBC Radio 4’s The Food Programme, presented by Dan Saladino, which approached the River Severn as a point of contact between local people and the European eel. In ‘Eels and Elvers’, Saladino followed the river’s course, tracing the points at which the working history of the Severn has shaped the present condition of the eel, and recorded conversations with fishermen, conservationists, and scientists who remain connected to this slow and complicated recovery. His observations unfolded gradually over time, describing how local work and international policy form a single conversation that extends from the tidal channels of western England to the committees and conventions through which the future of all freshwater eel species is being defined. 

Among the voices he gathered were those of Anastasiya Timoshyna from TRAFFIC,  who described the evolving regulation of trade and the emergence of a more coherent system of oversight; Richard Fleming, who launched a recent petition to end eel exports to Russia; and stakeholders in the Gloucestershire glass eel trade who articulated their stances on hand net fishing, restocking initiatives, and international trade. Historians and scientists contributed reflections on the place of the eel in Europe’s cultural and culinary history, suggesting that what once served as food and currency has now become an emblem of ecological memory. The discussion did not dwell on the eel’s decline: even if this was the primary thrust of the argument, it also showed how knowledge, when sustained through habit and observation, can support with population recovery. For the Sustainable Eel Group, the programme demonstrated how conservation depends as much on continuity of understanding as technological innovation, and how the lived experience remains central to the formulation of effective policy. 

Andrew Kerr, Chairman of the Sustainable Eel Group, was interviewed beside the two-metre-tall weir at Fromebridge Mill, a structure whose presence summarises two centuries of industrial alteration. He described how the nineteenth century, in its drive to manage and utilise water, imposed a physical inheritance that continues to define the possibilities of restoration. The construction of dams, weirs, pumps, and hydropower systems has divided Europe’s rivers into disconnected segments, reducing the freedom of migration that once defined their character.

Saladino drew listeners’ attention towards the Environment Agency and NGOs like Severn Rivers Trust and Gloucestershire Wildlife Trust, which has invested more than thirty million pounds in eel passes and related works intended to diminish these effects. The sum, he felt, conveyed the seriousness of public effort and the scale of the challenge, which can seem almost impossible to overcome. But Kerr took a more optimistic note, explaining that while present-day arrivals to the Severn amount to less than ten per cent of their historical levels, between fifty and one hundred million young eels still enter the river each year.

In his remarks, Kerr described the eel as falling victim to the combined pressures of barriers, habitat loss, and the fragmentation of migratory routes and he observed that the essential instruments for recovery are already in place. The Eel Regulation provides the legal and structural framework, the scientific principles are well established, and the necessary management plans are active across Europe. The remaining task lies in the consistent and collective application of these tools, guided by the forty-per-cent silver eel escapement target that helps defines adequate protection under the European Union’s Eel Regulation. 

An important discussion point for the programme was the decision made by the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs to prohibit exports from the United Kingdom to Kaliningrad in Russia. When asked for comment, Kerr explained that the Sustainable Eel Group had ‘expressed serious doubts’ regarding its compliance with existing controls, but that the final judgement ultimately rested with the Government following its own extensive inquiry. This sequence of events illustrated the value of open engagement between scientific organisations, policy makers, and enforcement bodies when challenges arise. It also reflected a broader pattern that is now emerging within eel governance, in which practical expertise, evidence, and authority are linked through shared responsibility. 

In its final section, the broadcast looked ahead to the forthcoming Conference of the Parties to CITES, where world governments will consider the proposal to include all Anguilla species in Appendix II. The Sustainable Eel Group is proactively supports this proposal, which it considers to be a necessary step to improving traceability, ensuring legality, and integrating national systems into a coherent global approach. Such a listing would extend the principles of transparency and accountability that have guided European eel protection to the entire genus, and it would make fishers and farmers key parts of the solution to conservation issues. This is in stark contrast to proposals made by the Michelin-starred chef Michael Cimarusti, another guest on the programme, to abstain from efforts to regulate international supply chains, and instead ban eel fishing altogether.  

Through its careful narrative, ‘Eels and Elvers’ revealed how history, policy, and practice now converge around a single question of governance. Each intervention, from the construction of eel passes to the reform of trade law, is part of a wider process that measures success not through declarations but through the slow improvement of natural conditions within the rivers themselves. The Sustainable Eel Group continues to champion this process through its partnerships with governments, scientists, and the many individuals who maintain direct contact with the species. The story told on the Severn is part of a larger, international history in which knowledge, regulation, and collaboration are beginning to replace the fragmentation of the past with a new sense of collective purpose. 

The episode Eels and Elvers is available on BBC Sounds.