‘Small scale fishing should be exempted from WTO talks’

“India is the only country where small-scale fishers fish in large numbers and we hardly have deep sea fishing. Over 70 per cent of the fishermen are below the poverty line and for us, fishing is a livelihood issue. Fishermen are not responsible for decline in fish. It is because of other factors like industrial pollution, global warming and coastal degradation which has affected the fishers,” Olencio Simoes, General-Secretary – National Fishworkers’ Forum (NFF) said at a press briefing.

NFF further told the government that there is a need for a robust domestic fisheries policy that aligns with international negotiations and without a cohesive national policy to define small-scale, artisanal and indigenous fish worker rights, their unique characteristics and fishing methods, India’s position at the WTO may lack the necessary foundation for effective representation.

“We advocate for a policy like the ‘Coastal Rights Bill’ that not only protects the interests of the government’s goals in sustainability of fish stocks but percolates down to the specific needs of small-scale fisheries (SSF) in India,” NFF added.

Ranja Sengupta, Senior Researcher, Trade Programme of Third World Network (TWN) said that there is no rush to conclude the fisheries subsidies negotiations in MC13. Most other issues of interest to developing countries and LDCs, for example in agriculture, are not getting any outcome in MC13. A bad outcome can forever jeopardize the future growth potential of their fisheries sector and the possibility of generating livelihoods therefrom.

The Agreement on Fisheries Subsidies (AFS) was signed in 2022 at the 12th Ministerial Conference (MC12) of the WTO, but covered only illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing and overfished stocks – consisting two out of the three pillars under consideration.

Under the AFS, only a two-year special and differential treatment (S&D) exemption was made available for developing countries and least developed countries (LDCs).