The public availability of credible information is an essential element for sustainable fisheries management.
Improving the data generation and collection on catches helps improve fisheries research, and in turn, inform the choices for conservation of marine resources and fisheries access allocation.
Transparency helps fight corruption and hold governments accountable for sustainable management of fisheries resources.
Transparency is a prerequisite for informed public debates and the effective participation of all stakeholders in the decision-making.
Isabella Lovin at the European Parliament. Photo: Fredrik Hjerling
“The public has the right to know how much is being paid, how much is being fished, how and by whom.” ”
Joint fisheries ventures
For more than 60 years, African countries have been encouraging the creation of joint ventures with foreign industrial fishing companies.
These joint ventures are often put in place with limited knowledge of ecosystems, of the state of fisheries resources or of the dynamics of the local fisheries sector. They have also often been denounced for their opacity and for their involvement in systematic fraudulent practices.
The proliferation of industrial vessels in African waters, including under the guise of joint ventures has resulted in over-capacity and overfishing and in damages to marine ecosystems and to the coastal communities that depend on them.
what are we doing?
For more than 20 years, we have worked to render information about EU Fishing fleets access to African waters, including through fishing agreements, and related documents (such as the fishing agreements evaluations) publicly available. In 2011, we supported African professional organisations to hold a first workshop regarding transparency in African fisheries management. Since then…
We coordinate with other civil society organisations to hold the EU external fleets accountable;
We raise awareness about the nefarious effects of opacity and corruption in fisheries management and its impacts on African coastal and fisheries communities;
We advocate for resources to be allocated prioritizing those who fish most sustainably and bring the most social and economic benefits to coastal developing countries; and
We promote more transparent fisheries management globally, and support local and pan-African artisanal fisheries professional organisations in their advocacy for transparency at local and regional level.
The FiTI Standard is an agreement which comprises 12 transparency requirements regarding which information on fisheries should be published by governments.
latest publications on transparency
The author makes 4 recommendations to make the external dimension of the CFP more effective: (1) the EU should shift from access agreements to fisheries governance agreements, while (2) continuing to support informed participation of stakeholders in third countries; (3) it should also ensure that all vessels of EU origin, including those reflagged, abide by sustainability standards; and (4) it should actively engage, at international level, to promote transparent, fair, and sustainable access arrangements applicable to all fleets of foreign origin fishing in developing countries.