WTO Negotiations Could Soon End Exploitative Fishing Subsidies

Open water fishery crisis is one of the greatest “tragedies of the commons. Although open water fish stocks are a public resource, governments have degraded their value by subsidizing fisheries. According to the World Trade Organization, governments spend between $14 and $54 billion on global fishery subsidies every year. By reducing costs, these subsidies allow fisheries to catch more fish over greater distances, which has attracted “free riders” entering the fishing industry and taking advantage of the subsidies. The result is widespread overfishing: fisheries that would naturally have low profitability are being artificially exhausted. Subsidies are both environmentally and economically unsustainable; driving fish stocks towards depletion and providing a shaky lifeline to the fishing industry,.

Unlike resources such as coal and petroleum that have fixed amounts and locations, open water fisheries are a living resource that changes positions over a range of territory. Most fishery activity takes place in international waters, where no country’s jurisdiction applies and enforcement is not only costly, but nearly impossible. Fishing companies compete both with each other and the ecosystem’s natural predators. Fish are not like other livestock, which humans extracted from natural environments to regulate their populations artificially.  Moreover, fish feed not only humans, but also a complex ecosystem of species whose balance is strictly dependent on the strength and sustainability of the food chain.

According to the Food and Agriculture Organization, overfishing has been a growing problem since the 1970s. From 1974 to 2017, the share of global fish stocks that were biologically unsustainable grew from 10% to 34.2%. This figure exceeds 50% in fishing regions, including the Mediterranean and Black Sea, Southeast Pacific, and Southwest Atlantic.

The growth rate of the fish population decreases as overfishing increases. As the supply of fish is exhausted, the fishing industry faces long-term decline. Both the health of the industry and food security of millions who consume fish depend entirely on the biological sustainability of the resource.

Since 2017, the World Trade Organization (WTO) has renewed its effort to negotiate a multilateral arrangement to prohibit subsidies and overfishing. While most countries anticipate the final stage of negotiations to take place this summer, the process has been beset by delays due to the complexities of global fishing, competing interests, and the COVID-19 pandemic. Limitations on captures and stock assessments, differential treatment for least developed nations, the extent of coverage for artisanal and small-scale fisheries practices, enforcement and dispute settlement procedures, and fishing in contested territorial waters all require specific guidelines that all parties can agree to. This has delayed the negotiations, which were intended to conclude by the end of 2020.

Developing a consensus among the highest-subsidizing countries has been difficult. These nations include China, the European Union, the United States, Japan, and South Korea, which collectively spend almost 60% of global fishery subsidies. For some of these countries, fish are a substantial part of the population’s diet. Even with subsidies, overseas fishing is a relatively cheap way to access animal protein. Since fishing is conducted in open international waters, fishing also comes at almost no cost to countries’ own resources.

Given the global turbulence brought on by the pandemic, recent increases in agricultural commodities prices, and some countries’ irreconcilable positions, finding an optimal solution to the problem seems unfeasible. However, the WTO can surely pursue a solution that at least improves the status quo. The organization’s new leadership – elected this year with a consensus of all members – has the political strength to coordinate a comprehensive solution among the main actors of this dispute. The most important and necessary requirement is that no free rider is left off the hook.