Global effort to save ocean fish may pay off

Fish populations are overexploited

After 20 years of negotiations, the World Trade Organization is accelerating an effort to end $22 billion in government subsidies that prop up fishing industries-a key driver of plummeting fish stocks all over the world.

Currently, some 34 per cent of global fish populations are overexploited, according to the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization. In the least developed countries, fish make up over 25 per cent of protein consumption; in coastal communities, it can be up to 80 per cent.

Yet, the wealthiest countries subsidise industrial fleets that outcompete small-scale fishermen in poorer nations.

Unless something is done, environmentalists warn that the pace of overfishing threatens an unprecedented global hunger crisis and ecological disaster.

This year,

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WTO director-general Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, a Nigerian economist who is both the first woman and African to hold the position, made the issue her top priority-with a conference set for July that could help seal an international accord. Isabel Jarrett, manager of the Reducing Harmful Fisheries Subsidies programme at The Pew Charitable Trusts, said of the negotiations: "We are closer than ever before to an agreement."

But bids by several nations for exemptions and loopholes could jeopardise its effectiveness at a critical moment for the planet's oceans.

Nations intent on protecting food access and local economies have been pouring money into fishing for decades, encouraging the continued depletion of resources by enabling struggling fisheries to expand.

In the 1970s, only 10 per cent of the world's known fish resources were overfished, a figure that has since more than tripled. Nevertheless, the industry continues to catch the same amount of fish as it did decades ago: The global marine catch has been about 81 million tonnes a year since the 1990s. Much of that is driven by subsidies.

Ironically, reducing fishing pressure will allow stocks to rebound, improving global food security-a critical consideration given the global population has climbed by more than 2.4 billion since 1990. If governments ended subsidies, more than 35 million tonnes of fish-or 12.5 per cent of all the fish in the sea-could be restored by 2050, according to researchers.

The top five biggest providers of subsidies are China, the United States, the European Union, Japan and South Korea, which combine to dole out more than 50 per cent of fisheries subsidies.