Back to PCFFA Fishermen's News
Archive
Coastal fishing communities around the world got some good news in September. The most recent attempt to strip control of public fisheries resources from national governments under the auspices of global free trade were halted (at least temporarily) at a recent meeting of the World Trade Organization (WTO). Through international cooperation, fishing men and women are proving their resolve against the continuing threats posed by the WTO and other bilateral free trade agreements.
Last month, trade representatives from 146 countries left the Caribbean resort city of Cancun, Mexico after four days of negotiations with nothing to show for it aside from a few souvenirs and an education in the power of strategic alliances. The goal of their gathering, or Ministerial, had been to finalize free trade agreements that would control many market sectors, including fisheries. This Fifth Ministerial of the WTO was to be a strategic step in a five-year process of developing a global trade agreement. That process began anew in 1999 after a similar stalemate at a Ministerial in Seattle, Washington, U.S.A. Instead of making progress on their goals however, the trade representatives were left with yet another stalemate. In the case of fisheries, however, stalemate is good news.
Most major news reports attribute the failure of the negotiations held 10-14 of September to coordinated actions among representatives from 23 developing nations. However, as in Seattle, participation by non-governmental organizations like the World Forum of Fish Harvesters & Fish Workers (World Forum), of which PCFFA is a delegate, also played a crucial role in directing the talks.
Major fisheries trade and management issues including privatization, labeling and subsidies were all on the agenda for the Cancun Ministerial. Fishing men and women from around the world responded by not only preparing a formal policy declaration opposing the WTO’s involvement in fisheries regulation, we did so with the help and input of commercial fishermen from all around Mexico, including in a fishing village within sight of the tourists’ haven. The final document made clear the World Forum’s position that fisheries resources are a public resource to be managed for the benefit of local populations, not a private commodity to be carved up by multi-national corporations. Furthermore, the declaration outlined the intrinsic rights of fishermen and fishing communities to derive their livelihood from those resources. The creed for this collaboration was “Fishery Resources Are Not For Sale” (“Las Pescas No Estan En Venta”)
What the World Forum delegates discovered during those meetings was that regional fisheries associations and cooperatives in Mexico are often unaware of the problems that other groups face. In one example, a fisherman from the Gulf of California, Roberto Ortega, spoke of the impact that industrial trawlers are having on the local shrimp fishery. While the coastal fishermen in that region are aware of the damage being wrought on that fishery by the industrial harvesters, they lack the research capacity to prove their losses. Without any scientific evidence to support them, fishermen’s efforts to organize and protest the industrial trawlers have been rejected by the Mexican government. Then on July 31 the Mexican government took action to suppress the coastal fishermen’s organization by sending a force of 600 state and federal police officers to arrest their leader, Jesus Maria Leal Leyva.
Though the World Forum was not prepared to take legal action on behalf of Mr. Leyva, PCFFA volunteered to investigate sources that might be willing to fund a research project or survey of existing research that might shed some light on the impacts of various fishing methods on the Gulf of California shrimp fishery. This situation presents a theme common among traditional fishing communities around the world: the need for scientific data coupled with lack of resources to get it. Unfortunately, the burden of proof is often shifted away from corporate interests that seek involvement in a fishery. Because the perception of increased revenue and commerce leads governments to believe that free-trade will bring only benefits, they often fail to recognize that commerce, especially in the case of fisheries, is based on harvesting from the natural world. What that line of reasoning leaves local communities with is often no more than a polluted and over-harvested environment that can no longer support them.
Sometimes un-checked free trade can cost local people jobs because products become cheaper artificially. Pacific Salmon fishermen have seen this example for themselves, predominantly from imported farmed salmon products. But the salmon fishery is not the only domestic fishery to feel the impacts of unrestricted trade. Shrimp fishermen have likewise seen the value of their fisheries decline in recent years as a result of unrestricted imports of farmed shrimp.
Two new participants in the World Forum meetings last month were Kevin and Margaret Curole of Cut Off, Louisiana. Kevin is a shrimper and member of the Louisiana Shrimpers Association (LSA), representing the largest community of shrimpers in the Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico fisheries. Margaret is Vice-President of the Ladies of Lafourche Shrimpers, Inc. (LLS), a women’s organization that supports the work of the LSA. Just this year the LLS and LSA have decided to take action on behalf of their fisheries by filing an anti-dumping petition with the U.S. Department of Commerce seeking protective tariffs to offset the damage being done by farmed shrimp imports. Their research shows that some foreign governments are not only sponsoring the under-priced imports but, in some cases, virtually forcing citizens to use toxic chemicals in their operations. In light of the latter information, the Louisiana shrimpers may also accuse some foreign governments of human rights abuses.
Stakes are high for these shrimpers and their communities. The petition’s filing will cost them between $2 million and $4 million depending on the number of countries they indict. But they may have no other choice. According to Kevin, thousands of shrimpers in Louisiana now sell their catch hoping only to make enough to fill the tanks for another trip, while farmed imports continue to hold prices down and subsidized factory boats simply freeze their catch until they can turn a profit.
The motto of the LLS is “Unity in our Community,” and for the shrimpers in Louisiana this truly is about communities. In Cancun, Margaret said that the support shrimpers are receiving from various individuals and business is a testament to the importance of the petitioning effort. For example, the owner of the local hardware store donated because he knows that his business will not survive without the shrimpers.
Members of the LSA along with shrimpers from eight other Southern states in the Southern Shrimp Alliance recently took another action many of them never thought they would as fishermen. On 26 July they gathered in New Orleans to participate in a protest against negotiations for a trade agreement between the United States and five Central American countries called – you guessed it – the Central American Free Trade Agreement. That day shrimpers, all wearing hats and T-shirts reading “Save the Commercial Fishermen,” filled the streets of New Orleans alongside other more stereotypical anti-globalization protestors. Other shrimpers protested that day at ports throughout the Southeast in solidarity with the shrimpers in New Orleans.
The Curoles came to Cancun on a week’s notice unsure of what they would find. What they found in the World Forum was a community of fishermen from across the globe now dealing with similar threats to a way of life that has no value to the economists and trade representatives making global trade deals. Many of those other fishermen live in the same countries whose governments support the unsustainable fisheries operations threatening the shrimpers in the Southern U.S. These are fishermen from places like Honduras and Guatemala who have been displaced by shrimp farms, many of which are owned by multi-national corporations, that bring pollution and habitat destruction to the coastal mangrove forests in exchange for shrimp sold in distant markets.
Other important alliances recently initiated have included a request by the National Association of Fishing Cooperatives, representing coastal fishermen from Japan, South Korea and Taiwan, to join with the World Forum. In each case fishing communities in these countries are realizing the benefits of working together to oppose the industrial fishing interests that are already reaping the benefits of so-called free trade agreements.
Previous Fishermen’s News articles have outlined the WTO’s agenda for fisheries regulation (See FN, April 2002, “Not Fish Friendly: The WTO’s New Doha Agenda for Fisheries” (http://www.pcffa.org/fn-apr02.htm) and April 2003, “Trade Decisions Could Transform Fisheries” (http://www.pcffa.org/fn-apr03.htm). In August of this year the World Forum was notified that its registration to attend the Cancun Ministerial as a Non-Governmental Organization (NGO) had been accepted. As a result, three representatives from the Forum were given security clearances to attend the gathering as observers.
When the dust settled in Cancun it became clear that the trade ministers had not even been able to discuss the issues of privatization, subsidies, genetically modified organisms, or labeling. The ministers never got past the topic of foreign investment, which trade representatives from the U.S. and European Union were using as bargaining points over the highly contentious agricultural subsidies policies. This total breakdown of negotiations shows that some nations are not yet convinced that WTO-style trade is the best alternative for their economies and cultures.
On the heels of the victory in Cancun coastal fishermen plan to gather in Lisbon, Portugal in either April or November of 2004. At this Third General Assembly, World Forum delegates and observers will have at least two goals: 1) to include all interested nations and 2) to finalize a forum position on acceptable standards for the regulation of foreign investment and fisheries privatization. While the World Forum and its member countries have clearly announced their opposition to the WTO’s proposals, it is vital that we find consensus on these and other fisheries management issues if progress is to continue.
The process will not be easy. Underlying these issues is a core definition of sustainable fisheries. Whether you prefer the terms “traditional,” “coastal,” “artisanal,” “small-scale,” “independent” or “sustainable,” a growing alliance of fishermen from all around the world must first define what we hold in common when it comes to the ways we fish and the ways we want our fisheries regulated.
We must also continue to reach out to fishing communities around the world. The strength of the World Forum depends on the number and diversity of communities it represents. In support of this idea, the Forum decided in Cancun to change its requirement of a $250 annual membership from each country. Instead countries will be asked for membership contributions. Whether monetary or in-kind, the contributions will open the World Forum to representation from the fishermen of many more nations while ensuring that the job of protecting our fisheries is done.
Although the WTO fisheries negotiations have stalled for now, fishermen should continue to remain active in their individual countries as bilateral and multilateral free trade agreements continue to be struck. U.S. Trade Representative Robert Zoellick remained defiantly confident after the collapse of talks in Cancun. He even assured the press that, “We will find countries that want to open up markets with the United States.”
Under existing proposals the Free Trade Agreement of the Americas (FTAA) would regulate trade among all nations of the western hemisphere (except Cuba). These nations are made up of populations totaling over 800 million with a combined annual gross national product of $11 Trillion (US). Impacts to fisheries could come from agricultural regulations, water privatization and relaxed regulations regarding genetically modified organisms (GMOs). Many of these policies are based on those already being considered by the WTO.
But while the current round of WTO negotiations has stalled in Cancun, FTAA preparations seem to be moving along without the same dissent among participating nations which was so crucial to the collapse in Cancun. Therefore, it is even more important that fishermen remain vigilant and vocal regarding this incarnation of corporate globalization.
The next FTAA summit will be back in Miami, Florida, U.S.A. from 20-21 November. Individual fishermen should write to their Congressional members as well as President George W. Bush and the U.S. Trade Representative Robert Zoellick to voice their concerns over this and other similarly flawed trade agreements.
History will show that the Fifth Ministerial Meeting of the WTO ended abruptly without any substantive agreements. The true measure of success, however, will be in the fortitude with which fishing men and women around the world continue to voice their opinions when it comes to the globalization of fisheries management and trade. No one knows the fisheries like the fishermen, and if we aren’t willing to speak out to save our fisheries, no one will.
The major lesson from Cancun is that dealing with issues like trade in today’s world requires strong alliances with international partners. PCFFA and the World Forum of Fish Harvesters & Fish Workers are committed to that goal and look forward to furthering those alliances next year in Portugal.
Reid Bryson is a Policy Analyst working with the Institute for Fisheries Resources (IFR) on international and national sustainable fisheries issues. Victor Menotti is with the International Forum on Globalization and an IFR Associate working on international trade issues. IFR is affiliated with PCFFA and can be reached at: Southwest Regional Office: PO Box 29196, SF, CA USA 94129-0196, (415)561-3474; Northwest Regional Office: PO Box 11170, Eugene, OR USA 97440-3370, (541)689-2000; or by email to: fish1ifr@aol.com. IFR’s web site is at: www.ifrfish.org.
(Puerto Morelos is the artesanal fishing village just south of Cancun, Mexico)