1st April 2006
Fisheries Access Agreements: Trade and Development Issues
Fish and fish products provide important trade and livelihoods opportunities in many coastal developing countries. Nearly 40 percent of fish output is traded internationally with an export value of US$ 58.2 billion, making seafood one of the most extensively traded commodities in the world. Exports of fish products in developing countries today comprise 20 percent of agricultural and food processing exports – more than tropical beverages, nuts, spices, cotton, sugar and confectionary combined. These opportunities are likely to increase as demand for fish products continues to soar. In addition to providing a significant source of export revenue for developing countries, the fishing sector also constitutes a vital component of domestic food intake and an important provider of local livelihoods.
However, market access barriers and fisheries subsidies continue to pose serious obstacles for developing countries to expand their participation in international trade, add value to their exports and ensure rural development. These barriers include stringent standards, anti-dumping measures and traceability requirements in export markets. In addition, fisheries subsidies in industrialised countries have contributed to market distortions, reducing developing countries’ ability to compete with subsidised fleets and often making it economically unviable for poor countries to build up their own fishing industries. These impacts are particularly acute where distant water fishing fleets enter national waters under bilateral access agreements, out-competing national fishers and exploiting the coastal states’ resources often in the absence of adequate management and enforcement procedures.
Meanwhile, fish stocks around the world are disappearing at an alarming rate. The UN Food and Agriculture Organization estimates that as much as 75 percent of global marine fish stocks are now fully exploited, over-exploited or depleted, confirming a consistent decrease since 1974 in marine fish stocks with potential for further exploitation. Inappropriately designed subsidies to fishing industries have been widely recognised as one of the key economic drivers of overexploitation of fisheries resources by contributing to significant overcapacities of fishing fleets, particularly in developed countries. Large-scale industrial fleets have also contributed to secondary pressures on marine resources, such as increased levels of bycatch – that is, species that are caught unintentionally by fishing gear – and the use of destructive fishing practices which harm non-target species and marine ecosystems.
Some of these pressures are further exacerbated through fisheries access agreements – commonly entered into by a distant water fishing (DWF) nation on behalf of its fishing fleet (or by the fleet itself) and a ‘host’ country – that do not take sufficient account of sustainability considerations or provide adequate returns for the host countries. In some regions, such as West Africa and the South Pacific, fishing by DWF fleets under access agreements makes up the vast majority of fishing in their Exclusive Economic Zones. Concerns have been raised that these agreements are frequently not based on a comprehensive fisheries management plan, and that the amount of access fees often does not reflect the value of the catch nor does the revenue contribute to developing the local fishing sector.
In recognition of some of these concerns, governments at the 2001 Ministerial Conference of the World Trade Organization (WTO) in Doha agreed to “clarify and improve WTO disciplines on fisheries subsidies, taking into account the importance of this sector to developing countries”. Among WTO Members, the “Friends of Fish” group – including, among others, Australia, Chile, New Zealand, the Philippines, Peru and the US – have been at the forefront of pushing for the launch of negotiations. After several years of discussions and initial strong resistance from Japan and Korea, broad agreement has now emerged on the need to prohibit certain subsidies that contribute to overcapacity and overfishing, as noted in the Ministerial Declaration adopted at the WTO Ministerial Conference in Hong Kong (December 2005).
In the Ministerial Declaration, governments also explicitly recognised the importance of the sector for addressing development priorities, poverty reduction, and livelihood and food security concerns. This explicit recognition provides an important window of opportunity to integrate public policy considerations in the negotiations and the disciplines. How to address access fees has emerged as one of the key development issues in the talks. Given that 70 to 80 percent of EU and US fisheries access fees are paid by governments rather than the fleets, it has been argued that these payments have contributed to overcapacities of DWF fleets by making it more economically viable for them to fish in distant waters. At the same time, the economic importance of access fees to some developing countries has been widely recognised, which needs to be taken into account if access fees are to be disciplined.
To address these development priorities while balancing them with sustainability objectives, policies and positions will need to listen to and reflect the voices of those whose livelihoods will ultimately be affected by the subsidies disciplines – including fisherfolk, fishing communities and related industries – but who continue to remain on the sidelines of the debate. Moreover, there is need for analysing domestic realities and priorities in developing countries’ fisheries in order to inform and shape negotiating positions and domestic flanking policies.
This issue paper – published in the context of the ICTSD project on Fisheries, International Trade and Sustainable Development – aims to contribute to this debate in an effort to develop traderelated fisheries policies and rules that are supportive of both resource management and livelihoods objectives. To this end, Stephen Mbithi Mwikya – a fisheries expert from the Kenya Fish Processors and Exporters Association – provides an overview of different types of fisheries access agreements and assesses their socio-economic and sustainability impacts, including on employment, value-addition, competitiveness and stock levels. He examines a range of policy options for addressing access fess in the fisheries subsidies negotiations, negotiating fisheries access agreements, and setting up domestic policies to enable developing countries to exploit their own fisheries resources.
We hope that you will find this paper to be stimulating and useful for your work.