The ocean covers more than 70 percent of our planet’s surface, produces half of the oxygen we breathe, feeds billions of people and provides hundreds of millions of jobs. It also plays a major role in mitigating climate change: More than 80 percent of the global carbon cycle passes through the ocean.
Yet this precious natural resource is not invincible. Despite all the benefits it affords us, the ocean today faces unprecedented human-made crises that threaten its health and its ability to sustain life on Earth.
The greatest threat to marine biodiversity is overfishing. More than one-third of global fish stocks are overfished and a further 60 percent are fully fished.
Each year, governments around the world encourage overfishing by providing US$22 billion in harmful fisheries subsidies. Although these subsidies are designed to help support coastal communities, they instead prop up unsustainable and unprofitable fishing activity, depleting the very resource on which local populations’ livelihoods depend.
This problem is not new. The WTO’s members have been trying to negotiate a deal to curb these damaging payments since 2001. World leaders reiterated their commitment to tackling the issue when they agreed in 2015 to the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
Under SDG 14, which aims to put a healthy ocean at the heart of the global sustainable-development agenda, leaders promised by last year to reach an agreement at the WTO that would reduce fisheries subsidies.
However, they missed the deadline, as negotiations slowed during the worst of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Research shows that if WTO members were to eliminate all harmful fisheries subsidies — the most ambitious scenario — global fish biomass could increase by 12.5 percent by 2050.
That is an additional 35 million tonnes of fish, or more than four times North America’s annual fish consumption in 2017 — and that is a conservative estimate. Removing destructive subsidies really would mean more fish in the sea.
The aim is not to remove support from fishing communities, but rather to redirect it in a more meaningful and less damaging way. Even if a deal does not eliminate all harmful subsidies, it would create a global framework of accountability and transparency for subsidy programs.
That, in turn, would spur dialogue between governments, fishing communities and other stakeholders to spur the development of redesigned policies that better support fishers while protecting the global commons.
Moreover, an agreement is within reach — if the political will is there to deliver it. The most recent lapse of the negotiations resulted from differences over how to structure flexibility in subsidy regimes for developing countries, as well as how to define and enforce rules on illegal fishing and sustainable stocks.
However, after numerous proposals and discussions, the comprehensive draft now on the table combines measures to curb harmful subsidies with specific exceptions for developing countries.
The WTO’s 12th Ministerial Conference in Geneva, Switzerland, was due to start on Tuesday, but was postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. No new date has been set for the conference, but it would be the opportune moment for a deal.
Failure to conclude one would not only harm the ocean and the livelihoods of those who depend upon it, but would also diminish the global rules-based system and damage the pursuit of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.
In contrast, ending harmful fisheries subsidies would reduce the cumulative pressures on the ocean and increase its resilience in the face of climate change.
In the wake of the COP26 UN climate summit in Glasgow, Scotland, governments must demonstrate their willingness to use every tool at their disposal to tackle the climate crisis. The stakes at the next WTO Ministerial Conference have perhaps never been higher.
The future of multilateral trade cooperation is at risk; but, above all, jobs, food security and the health of our global commons are on the line.
That is why 33 former government leaders and ministers from around the world have joined forces with nearly 400 scientists in urging WTO members to “harness their political mandate to protect the health of the ocean and the well-being of society.”
Governments have given their word that they will curb destructive fisheries subsidies. The next meeting in Geneva would test the credibility of that pledge.
Helen Clark is a former New Zealand prime minister (1999-2008), Arancha Gonzalez is a former Spanish minister of foreign affairs (2020-21), Susana Malcorra is a former Argentine minister of foreign affairs (2015-17) and James Michel is a former president of the Seychelles (2004-2016).
This commentary is also signed by: Axel Addy, Liberian minister of commerce and industry (2013-2018); Mercedes Araoz, Peruvian prime minister (2017-2018) and vice president (2016-2020); Hakim Ben Hammouda, Tunisian minister of economy and finance (2014-2015); Herminio Blanco, Mexican minister for trade and industry (1994-2000); Maria Damanaki, European commissioner for maritime affairs and fisheries (2010-2014); Eduardo Frei Ruiz-Tagle, Chilean president (1994-2000); Michael Froman, US trade representative (2013-2017); Tim Groser, New Zealand minister of trade (2008-2015); Enrique V. Iglesias, Inter-American Development Bank president (1988-2005); Hilda Heine, Marshall Islands president (2016-2020); Ban Ki-moon, UN secretary-general (2007-2016); Ricardo Lagos, Chilean president (2000-2006); Pascal Lamy, WTO director-general (2005-2013); Roberto Lavagna, Argentine minister of economy (2002-2005); Cecilia Malmstrom, European commissioner for trade (2014-2019); Peter Mandelson, European commissioner for trade (2004-2008); Sergio Marchi, Canadian minister of international trade (1997); Heraldo Munoz, Chilean minister of foreign affairs (2014-2018); Pierre Pettigrew, Canadian minister for international trade (1999-2003) and minister of foreign affairs (2004-2006); Tommy Remengesau Jr, Palauan president (2001-2009, 2013-2021); Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, Spanish prime minister (2004-2011); Jose Manuel Salazar, Costa Rican minister of foreign trade (1997-1998); Susan Schwab, US trade representative (2006-2009); Juan Somavia, International Labour Organization director-general; Alberto Trejos, Costa Rican minister of foreign trade (2002-2004); Allan Wagner, Peruvian minister of foreign affairs (1985-1988, 2002-2003, 2021); Andres Velasco, Chilean minister of finance (2002-2006); Ernesto Zedillo Ponce de Leon, Mexican president (1994-2000); and Robert Zoellick, US trade representative (2001-2005).
Copyright: Project Syndicate
You wish every Taiwanese spoke English like I do. I was not born an anglophone, yet I am paid to write and speak in English. It is my working language and my primary idiom in private. I am more than bilingual: I think in English; it is my language now. Can you guess how many native English speakers I had as teachers in my entire life? Zero. I only lived in an English-speaking country, Australia, in my 30s, and it was because I was already fluent that I was able to live and pursue a career. English became my main language during adulthood
The international women’s soccer match between Taiwan and New Zealand at the Kaohsiung Nanzih Football Stadium, scheduled for Tuesday last week, was canceled at the last minute amid safety concerns over poor field conditions raised by the visiting team. The Football Ferns, as New Zealand’s women’s soccer team are known, had arrived in Taiwan one week earlier to prepare and soon raised their concerns. Efforts were made to improve the field, but the replacement patches of grass could not grow fast enough. The Football Ferns canceled the closed-door training match and then days later, the main event against Team Taiwan. The safety
There are moments in history when America has turned its back on its principles and withdrawn from past commitments in service of higher goals. For example, US-Soviet Cold War competition compelled America to make a range of deals with unsavory and undemocratic figures across Latin America and Africa in service of geostrategic aims. The United States overlooked mass atrocities against the Bengali population in modern-day Bangladesh in the early 1970s in service of its tilt toward Pakistan, a relationship the Nixon administration deemed critical to its larger aims in developing relations with China. Then, of course, America switched diplomatic recognition
The National Immigration Agency on Tuesday said it had notified some naturalized citizens from China that they still had to renounce their People’s Republic of China (PRC) citizenship. They must provide proof that they have canceled their household registration in China within three months of the receipt of the notice. If they do not, the agency said it would cancel their household registration in Taiwan. Chinese are required to give up their PRC citizenship and household registration to become Republic of China (ROC) nationals, Mainland Affairs Council Minister Chiu Chui-cheng (邱垂正) said. He was referring to Article 9-1 of the Act
RSS