International Fisheries

Governance and Management:

An Introduction
Amanda Nickson
Director, International Fisheries
The Pew Charitable Trusts

March 2019
Today:
• About Pew
• The big picture: people and fish
• The SOFIA Report
• EEZs vs High Seas: UNCLOS
• Flag to Fork: the basic fisheries governance pathway
• Basics of fisheries management: science, catch limits, gear controls,
compliance monitoring, enforcement
• The Regional Fishery Management Organizations (RFMOs)
• Flag states, port states, transshipment
• Take longline caught tuna for example….
• Gaps & challenges: revisiting the fisheries pathway
• Solutions & hot topics
• The take-aways…Rules & Consequences
• Questions?
About Pew
International NGO with headquarters in Philadelphia, USA

Offices in United States, Australia, European Union. Additional staff and

consultants in Canada, New Zealand, Latin America, Africa and the Pacific

Domestic public policy work on the intersection between state and federal policy health, economics,
and environment.
International policy work primarily fisheries sustainability, marine protected areas and terrestrial
conservation in Canada, Chile and Australia

Mission: To apply a rigorous analytical approach to improve

public policy, inform the public and stimulate civic life.
Governance
• 13-person board of directors responsible for
approving all substantive activities
Leadership • Directors and Managing Directors responsible for
day-to-day oversight of individual initiatives

• 7 charitable funds established between 1948 and

1979 by members of the Pew family
Funding • Additional resources provided through partnerships
with individuals, foundations, and corporations
The big picture: people and fish
• Oceans cover 70% of the Earth
• High seas is 2/3 of the world's ocean, and represent 95% of the
occupied habitat of Earth
• Over 2 billion people rely on wild caught fish
• Largest renewable protein resource on Earth
• Largest traded food commodity in the world
• Tuna alone: $42.5 billion/yr
• 93 % of marine fisheries fished at or beyond sustainable levels;
over 1/3 at unsustainable levels
• Up to 20% of fish caught is illegally caught
• … not to mention U, U: Unregulated, Unreported catches
 The SOFIA Report
• UN Food & Agriculture Organization State of World Fisheries and Aquaculture
• In 2015, 33.1% of stocks were fished at biologically unsustainable levels.
• 59.9% maximally sustainably fished (formerly “fully fished”)
• 7% underfished
• Through time, number of overfished stocks increased
• 43% of the principal market tuna stocks were fished at unsustainable levels
• Wild caught fisheries caught approximately 91 million tonnes in 2016, 79 million
from marine fisheries and the remainder from freshwater.
• China is by far the world’s largest producer of both wild caught and cultivated fish
• The top three wild caught species by volume in 2016 were 1) Alaskan pollack, 2)
Peruvian anchoveta (generally not consumed by people but used for fish oil and
fishmeal), and 3) skipjack tuna.
EEZ vs High Seas:
UN Law Of The Sea (‘82):
• Exclusive Economic Zone
• ownership of fishery resources
• National management regimes
• Access charges/agreements
• National legislation

High Seas:
• Everything beyond EEZs
• Multiple overlapping activity or
species based jurisdictions
• Relatively little legislative
framework – despite having 95%
habitat
Flag to Fork: A basic fisheries pathway:

Transshipment
Purse seine
Longlines
net
Regional Fishery Management Organizations:
Basics of fisheries management:
• How RFMO’s work:
• Arise from UN Fish Stocks Agreement
• Scientific Committees, Technical Committees, Compliance Committees,
CC, Commissions, Intersessional meetings
• Allocation (catch management)
• Conservation measures
• Consensus
• Science, stock assessments & catch limits e.g. quotas, or effort
management e.g. fishing days
• Gear controls (use of hooks & nets) & bycatch mitigation
• Compliance, Monitoring*/Control/Surveillance (MCS), & Enforcement

• * a word about “observers”

Regional Fishery Management Organizations:
Tuna
TUNA CATCHING COUNTRIES
RFMOs: the key players
• Japan
• China
• US
• EU ( +/- UK) • Many countries are
members of more than
• South Korea
one RFMO, but they
• Taiwan / Chinese Taipei don’t necessarily take
• Parties to the Nauru Agreement the same positions on
• North Africa issues in each RFMO
• Indonesia negotiation.
• Philippines
• Central American block
• Mexico
 THE WORLD’S MOST VALUABLE FISH
▪ Bluefin – 3 species
• Bluefin – 3 species
 TINNED AND FRESH DELICACY
• Yellowfin
▪ Yellowfin
 THE WORLD’S MOST ABUNDANT TUNA
▪ Skipjack
RFMOs: are they working?
• Case study: Atlantic bluefin
• Two stocks: eastern and western, both highly migratory, mix in North Atlantic
feeding grounds. Western stock smaller, spawns Gulf of Mexico. Eastern spawns
Med Sea. Both overfishing & illegal fishing for many years.
• ICCAT history of mismanagement: 2008 independent review “an international
disgrace.” Threat of international trade ban led to 2010 decision to set quotas
for eastern in line with scientific advice to help stock rebuild.
• The eastern stock has grown significantly since then. However, growth not
enough to confirm a full recovery at the last stock assessment in 2017, status
still unclear.
• The western stock estimated at just 45 to 69 % of what it was in 1974, when
already depleted.
• Despite new measures, still illegal fishing— October 2018: Spanish officials
arrested 79 people and seized more than 170,000 pounds of illegal bluefin a
sting operation.
• Is Atlantic Bigeye the next bluefin?
RFMOs: are they working?
• Case study: Pacific bluefin
• Single stock crossing two management zones: Western and Central Pacific
Fisheries Commission (WCPFC) Northern Committee and the Inter-American
Tropical Tuna Commission (IATTC)
• 2018 stock assessment shows it has been fished down more than 96 % from its
historic size.
• In 2017, joint meeting of IATTC & WCPFC, agreed to rebuilding plan.
• But: long-term plan would rebuild the species to 20 percent of pre-fishing levels
by 2034, lacks ambition.
• Last 2 yrs: the US, Japan, South Korea, and Mexico all have exceeded their catch
limits, putting any recovery in jeopardy.
• Jan ‘19, a 612-pound Pacific bluefin tuna sold for US$3.1 million at auction.
• Japan’s fishers have pushed for quota increases as recently as last year—even
with the population still below 4 percent of its historic highs.
• Japanese government only dropped proposal after international opposition, and
likely will try for increases again this year.
Flag States & Port States:
• Flag State:
➢ The flag State has responsibility under international law for controlling the
fishing activities of a vessel, no matter where the vessel operates.
➢ No single list of responsibilities and no accountability mechanisms
➢ “Flags of Convenience” : a flag of a country under which a vessel is registered to
avoid financial charges or regulations in the vessel owner's country.

• Port State:
➢ The port State is the country where the vessel enters and with whose laws the
vessel must comply with when in the State’s waters.
➢ Port State Measures Agreement: adopted in 2009 by the United Nations Food
and Agriculture Organization (FAO), requires parties to place tighter controls on
foreign-flagged vessels seeking to enter and use ports to land or transship fish.
Over 50 parties.
➢ PSMA: requires further ratification and implementation
Transshipment:
• The movement of fish from one vessel to another
• Hundreds of refrigerated cargo vessels, or fish “carriers,” roam the oceans,
transferring fresh catch from thousands of fishing vessels and taking it to the first
point of landing on shore for processing.
• Little/no effective oversight – black hole for data
• Lack of effective monitoring and control = IUU.
• Concerns beyond fish: trafficking drugs/guns/people/other , maritime security
• In WCPO: more than $142 million worth of tuna and tuna-like product lost in illegal
transshipments each year.
• Tunas, (bluefin, bigeye, yellowfin skipjack) make up large portion of transshipped
products : fresher fish = higher values at market.
• However: a wide range, including salmon, mackerel and crab.
• Carrier vessels are increasingly sailing under “flags of convenience”.
Let’s consider longline tuna:
• Larger tunas, sushi/sashimi market
• Tens of thousands of vessels globally - 3,500 in WCPO alone
• Less than 2% Observer coverage, despite existence of facilitating technology
• Disproportionate ecological impact
• Patchy data to base assessments on
• Little market awareness of supply chain issues
• Primarily Asian fleets, though also US
How does change happen?
Step 1:
Shine a light on
problem, create Step 2:
political will Bring solutions &
proof of concept,
Create pilot projects,
Expand to annual Step 3:
application Embed the solution
into system, leading
to enduring impact.
Revisiting the fisheries pathway: Help market
understand
policy needs
Create
cooperative
enforcement

Flag state Harvest

responsibilities strategies &
defined Compliance TS
regimes standards

Implement
PSMA

Transshipment
Purse seine
Longlines Reform LLs:
net Spawning ER/EM, Bycatch
Grounds rules
Solutions & Hot Topics:
• Hot Topics:
• Complexity of the catch and supply chain
• Political will in key countries
• Politicization of the science
• Allocation in a resource decline
• Rise of SIDS and developing world
• Eco-labels
• What about climate change?
• Solutions:
• Eco-labels e.g. Marine Stewardship Council
• Regulatory mechanisms & new technology can help create easier enforcement
• Harvest strategies: the closest we get to a silver bullet
• Making fisheries stories visible
• Connected, cooperative enforcement
Back to the big picture:
• Oceans cover 70% of the Earth
• High seas is 2/3 of the world's ocean, and represent 95% of the
occupied habitat of Earth
• Over 2 billion people rely on wild caught fish
• Largest renewable protein resource on Earth
• Largest traded food commodity in the world
• Tuna alone: $42.5 billion/yr
• 93 % of marine fisheries fished at or beyond sustainable levels;
over 1/3 at unsustainable levels
• Up to 20% of fish caught is illegally caught
• … not to mention U, U: Unregulated, Unreported catches
The Take Aways:
• Fisheries management internationally is a multi-link chain, not
properly connected yet;
• Science is still not yet embedded at the core of most
management decisions, which are made predominantly on
short term economic factors;
• Caught at Step 2 for Longlines, between Steps 2 and 3 for other
fisheries
• The issue is still largely invisible despite its reach and impact;
• This is a FIXABLE problem: Flag states, port states, RFMOs,
individual countries: all have actions that can be taken.
• The next 5 years will be critical: will RFMOs and country
managers take the appropriate actions?
•
TheTakeAwayscont’d:
• Rules and Consequences are needed:
• Rules: Flag states must take responsibility for their fleets
• Rules: RFMOs must adopt “harvest strategies” to ensure science drives
quotas/catch limits
• Consequences: RFMOs need compliance regimes with teeth
• Rules: Transshipment must be addressed as the black hole of illegal
activities through new international and RFMO oversight
• Consequences: PSMA must be implemented, removing incentive to
illegal activity and requiring verification of legality
• Consequences: Cooperative enforcement to ensure bad actors are
identified and apprehended.
AND
• Longlines must be addressed as a major gap in oversight and
governance
• Markets need education to understand how policy/regulatory oversight
helps them.
 Thank you…

Questions?