Fisheries subsidies: WTO members converge

Subsidies for unprofitable fishing fleets are believed to be a cause of overfishing in the seas. The WTO members have been wrestling for common rules for 20 years – and have now made an important step forward.

In a port, a crane unloads a fishing ship’s cargo: containers with fish, cooled with ice. The fishermen are still catching their nets. But a third of the world’s oceans are already considered overfished. State aid for huge fishing fleets, for example for fuel, is partly responsible for this.

Consultations dragged on for two decades

For 20 years now, the members of the World Trade Organization (WTO) have been advising on how to curb such subsidies, without success. But now there is a rapprochement on the way to a corresponding agreement, said WTO Director General Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala optimistically after the session marathon.

“We have been looking for the political will and support to move forward and for the first time in 20 years we have a text that has been agreed and approved by all the ministers and heads of delegations of the 128 members we have today,” said Okonjo- Iweala. The WTO chief, who has been in office since March, assessed the negotiations as follows: “We could not have wished for a better result, because it means that we can now take the next steps.”

States still require many exemptions

The eight-page draft agreement on the table lists a number of bans on subsidies. Exceptions are also planned for poorer countries. However, the conditions for this have yet to be worked out. Despite everyone’s agreement: There are still a number of differences. Many of the delegations asked for the text to be adapted, Okonjo-Iweala admitted: “The objections show that the member states are ready to use the text as a basis for further negotiations,” she said. “This can be deduced from the fact that many questions related to the draft. There are gaps that have to be filled and differences that the members have to bridge.”

The EU, for example, calls for exceptions to state aid if fish stocks are protected at the same time. China, the country with the world’s largest fishing fleet, is a developing country in the WTO; therefore he would be entitled to exemption rules. The US, for example, is demanding that the government in Beijing renounce special rights. China is unwilling to do this.

Aiming for an agreement at the end of the year

The aim is to pass the agreement at the World Trade Organization ministerial conference in December. For this to happen, unanimity must be achieved at the WTO. It is uncertain whether this will succeed, however, now that the negotiations have dragged on for two decades. The negotiator Santiago Wills, the ambassador of Colombia, was confident and recalled how necessary an agreement is: “20 years is long enough. If we continue negotiating for 20 years, there will be no more fish.”