Fishing

Even as fish stocks dwindle, some of the world’s richest nations are paying billions of dollars to keep flagging fishing industries afloat through fishing subsidies. The result: a growing series of economic, social, and environmental crises around the world.

Estimated at tens of billions of dollars per year, these subsidies are equivalent to roughly 20% to 25% of the value of the landed fish catch worldwide. This scale of subsidization is a huge incentive to expand fishing fleets and overfish. 

The challenge

Today’s global fishing fleet is estimated to be up to two and a half times the capacity needed to sustainably fish the oceans. Even as stocks of valuable fish have shrunk, the size of the world’s fishing fleets has exploded. Fishermen are using bigger and faster boats, with sophisticated devices to locate fish far below the surface. 

Taken all together, larger and more efficient fleets have dramatically raised the world’s fishing capacity, often leading to excess fishing effort, which puts unacceptable pressure on fish stocks. And with fish more difficult to find, the average fisherman must work harder to catch less. Government support to the fishing industry urgently needs to be reduced and reformed. 

The solution

To address the problem, WWF has made the reduction of harmful fisheries subsidies a core element of its fisheries program work.

The ultimate solution to the global fisheries crisis is better management of national and international fisheries, using measures such as setting reasonable catch limits and limits on the use of destructive gear. But better management alone will not solve the problem as long as there are irrational economic incentives to increase fishing. Some major fisheries remain outside of current management plans, many of which are inadequate or insufficiently enforced.

At the close of the 20th century, the world’s oceans are rife with illegal and uncontrolled fishing. Governments can’t be blamed for wanting to encourage investment in a sector that helps provide food security and that often offers jobs in struggling coastal regions. And some developing countries have a legitimate need to expand their fishing industry, even as fishing capacity worldwide needs to shrink. Fishery subsidies can also play an important role in promoting the adoption of environmentally friendly fishing techniques, such as helping fishermen adapt to new bans on driftnets, or supporting small-scale environmentally sustainable fishing. In fact, when properly designed, government supports can help reduce overcapacity.

In short, not all fisheries subsidies are bad But most are far from good. A World Bank study suggests that at most 5% of all fisheries subsidies have a positive environmental aim. And even subsidies designed to help fleets shrink – such as ‘vessel buy-back’ or decommissioning programmes – have often failed to achieve their goals. In several cases, buy-back programmes have actually provided funds that wind up being used for new technologies that increase overall capacity. In other cases, capacity reductions have been achieved in one nation’s waters by simply exporting capacity to foreign fishing grounds – a phenomenon that has played a significant role in the ‘serial depletion’ of commercial fisheries.

The road to reform

Fisheries subsidies are drawing growing attention. Studies of fisheries subsidies and their impacts are underway at the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), in APEC (the Pacific Rim trade forum), and within the EU. The FAO adopted a voluntary “plan of action” for the management of fishing capacity that urges governments to assess the effects of subsidies on their fleet capacity levels. And WTO action to agree new standards on fisheries subsidies looks increasingly likely. 

Meanwhile, there are signs of progress in key subsidizing nations. Countries such as Iceland, New Zealand, and Norway have substantially cut back on public supports to their fishing industries. The EU is reviewing some aspects of its’ subsidy policy, with some officials taking an increasingly critical stance. The US is looking at reforms, and is reportedly taking steps to improve its data collection and disclosure. 

In April 2011, the World Trade Organization’s (WTO) Negotiating Group on Rules issued a report that underscores the urgent need to halt government-subsidized overfishing. The report calls the dramatic decline in fisheries stocks “a crisis of exceptionally serious implications for all humankind.”  The report notes broad agreement that “subsidies play a major role” in contributing to the problem, and reflects “nearly universal calls” for WTO action to eliminate inappropriate fisheries subsidies in an effective way.   

Learn more

• Report emphasizes need for strong rules to rein in fisheries subsidies
• Catch of today, gone tomorrow
• Turning the tide
• Underwriting, Overfishing - fishing subsidies fact sheet
• What's the catch?