Failing the high seas: A global evaluation of regional fisheries management organizations
Introduction
Close to 60% of the oceans are outside national jurisdiction, i.e., beyond the 200 nm mile Exclusive Economic Zones (EEZs) of coastal countries, and thus, following the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea [1], belong to the ‘high seas’ [2]. Despite covering the majority of oceans, the high seas have, until relatively recently, been inaccessible to fishers: vast, rough, and far from coasts, fishers did not have the vessels or gear to exploit these areas.
Since the mid-20th century, however, progress in fishing technology (freezers, sonar, GPS) and cheap fossil fuel have allowed fishers to exploit the high seas, from which catches have thus increased [3], [4]. More dangerous and expensive than coastal fishing, fishing on the high seas is driven by its large rewards: toothfish, tuna, sharks, and certain billfish are all top predator fish of extremely high value [5], [6], [7], [8]. In the 1950s, catch from the high seas amounted to under two million tonnes; in 2006, this had grown to over ten million tonnes [9]. As a result, the fraction of the global marine catch originating from the high seas (as opposed to within EEZs) increased from 9% in 1950 to 15% in 2003 (see www.seaaroundus.org; catch decreases within EEZs also contributed to this, but to a lesser extent).
But who manages the high seas? Steeped in the antiquated dogma of Hugo Grotius’ ‘The Free Sea’ from the early 17th century, fishers have long considered the high seas as open-access, meaning anyone and everyone had rights to fish there. This perception, however, is obsolete today: regional fisheries management organizations (RFMOs) are currently the only legally mandated fisheries management bodies on the high seas, and countries’ commercial fishing fleets must abide by RFMO regulations in order to fish in these areas, as decreed by the 1995 Straddling Fish Stocks Agreement [10]. In other words, ‘The Free Sea’ is no more [11].
Almost all of the global high seas are now covered by at least one RFMO (Fig. 1). While more RFMOs are slated to come into existence soon, the effectiveness of current RFMOs has never been comprehensively assessed, despite indications that the decline of many high seas fish stocks [12] may be attributed to weaknesses within RFMOs themselves [13]. Indeed, the “ability of RFOs to be ‘vehicles of good governance’ to secure sustainable management has to be proven” [14]. This contribution addresses these concerns.
Here, the global evaluation on the effectiveness of RFMOs is based on a two-tiered system [15]: (1) in theory (or ‘on paper’), i.e., how well RFMOs meet standards as set by Lodge et al. [16] and as measured by the comprehensiveness of available information; and (2) in practice, i.e., how well the stocks under RFMO management do, as measured by current abundance (biomass) trends of managed stocks, and supported by trends through time.
Section snippets
Theoretical performance: ‘P’ scores
For this part of the study, the 18 current global RFMOs were analyzed, as characterized by FAO (see www.fao.org; and Zino [15]), i.e., all current regional fisheries organizations with management power. Also included are two ‘outgroups’ to test the scoring criteria: the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS), the national fisheries management agency of the USA, and the World Wildlife Fund (WWF), an international, environmental NGO involved in fisheries conservation issues (Table 1).
Here, the
Theoretical performance
Final P scores varied from 43% (PSC) to 74% (WCPFC), with an average score of 57% (0% being worst possible performance, and 100% being perfect performance; see www.seaaroundus.org for data matrix of all results and Table 3 for final P scores).
The overall highest scoring category across all RFMOs was by far ‘General Information and Organization,’ with a 70% average score. The overall lowest scores across RFMOs were those in the ‘Allocation’ category, which had an average score of 43%. The
P scores
Of all RFMOs, PSC received the overall lowest score at 43%; as with IPHC (52%), it is limited to just two contracting parties, Canada and the USA. In addition, PSC and IPHC are also the only two RFMOs functioning primarily within national jurisdiction. These organizations probably scored poorly in part because they do not fit the typical RFMO framework.
The RFMO with the highest P score was WCPFC with 74%, 10% higher than the next most effective RFMO (GFCM, see Table 3). Established in 2004,
Conclusion
In order to gauge the effectiveness of an RFMO, one must consider whether or not it has met its main goals. Objectives appear quite uniform across RFMOs (see www.seaaroundus.org), each emphasizing a commitment to the conservation of their stock(s) of interest, e.g., “…to contribute through consultation and cooperation to the optimum utilization, rational management and conservation of the fishery resources of the Convention Area” [34]. In this regard, RFMOs have failed. It is evident from the
Acknowledgements
The authors gratefully acknowledge Dr. Jackie Alder, Dr. Trond Bjorndal, and Dr. Ian Townsend-Gault for their valuable input. The authors would also like to thank Dr. Gordon Munro for sharing his vast knowledge on the subject of RFMOs. This contribution is part of the Sea Around Us Project, a collaboration between the Pew Environmental Group and the University of British Columbia.
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