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For its 2006-2008 Programme of Work the Committee for Fisheries worked on two major studies as follows:
Fisheries Policy Reform
The objectives of the project are to analyse drivers for and obstacles to policy reform in the fisheries sector and to identify the characteristics of successful reform in key fisheries policy areas. The project will highlight common elements in reform experiences to enhance the information base from which policy makers can draw as they undertake policy changes in their own countries and to assist countries in identifying strategies for overcoming obstacles to policy reform. The project addresses the process of reform in four key policy areas.
1. Labour market adjustment
A one-day Expert Meeting on “The Human Side of Fisheries Adjustment” was held in Paris in October 2006. The conference brought together a range of country experiences to share information on how different governments are addressing social issues in times of fishery sector adjustment. Further information on the Expert Meeting can be found here.
2. Decommissioning schemes
A publication has been issued by the OECD and has been available since January 2009. It develops a set of best practice guidelines, based on the analysis that identify the key areas that policy makers need to be aware of when designing decommissioning schemes. The guidelines are intended to assist policy makers ask the right set of questions as they develop programmes and will help ensure that decommissioning schemes are efficient and cost-effective in meeting their stated capacity reduction objectives. In July 2008, the principles and guidelines were adopted by the OECD as a Council Recommendation, relfecting the high level of political importance attached to the issue of ensuring effective fishing capacity adjustment and resource sustainability.
3. Domestic governance reform
4. International governance reform
Globalisation and the Implications of the OECD Fisheries and Aquaculture Sectors
Globalisation is an ongoing process which has increased rapidly in recent decades as communication and transport costs have been reduced significantly and border restrictions have been reduced or eliminated. In many countries, a more open trading and investment climate is in place, allowing countries to reap the benefits of lower trade and investment/services barriers.
The fisheries sector has been ‘going global’ for many hundreds of years due to the high mobility of fleets, the migratory nature of certain fisheries and the development of fish conservation techniques (salting, drying, and later, freezing). The fifteenth century herring trade in North Eastern Europe and the development of cod fisheries off the Canadian Grand Banks in the sixteenth century are cases in point. Such developments, mostly observed through increasing trade, were fuelled by better handling techniques and a growing appetite for fish in certain markets.
More recently, however, the process of globalisation in fisheries has become more complex as various parts of the value chain adjust to new opportunities created across the globe. In addition, and affecting value chain elements to various degrees, newly established international or national frameworks add complexity to the process. In addition consumers and investors put pressure on retailers, wholesalers and food service industries in terms of sustainability and specific production and harvesting techniques.
New players, institutions, legal frameworks, international commitments and action plans affecting fisheries interests/stakeholders and, in general, more complexity, have fuelled the need to better understand the globalisation process. The overall aim of the globalisation study is to identify if current national and international fisheries regulatory frameworks are able to cope with these new pressures that globalisation gives rise to, chief among which is a growing pressure on the fisheries resource base. This has implications for future domestic and international policy formulation and implementation.
One of the early outputs from this subject can be found at the page for the Workshop on Opportunities and Challenges of Fisheries Globalisation that took place in April 2007.
For its 2003-2005 Programme of Work the Committee for Fisheries worked on three major studies as follows:
Follow up to the fisheries market liberalisation
Taking into account the need to contribute to the WTO negotiations, this work will build on the existing analysis in the Liberalising Fisheries Markets: Scope and Effects and focus on new elements where a more detailed analysis is needed. In particular the Study will endeavour to provide more in-depth analysis of the links between fisheries subsidies and sustainable development and in this regard analyse subsidies from the sustainable development paradigm to assess both the economic, social and environmental issues of subsidies. In addition, the Study will also analyse the foreign investment and trade in services in the fisheries sector. Financial Support to Fisheries: Implications for Sustainable Development (2006) is the publication that encompasses this work. It explores the range of economic, environmental and social effects of financial support to the fisheries sector in OECD countries. The analysis is undertaken within a sustainable development paradigm, emphasising the effects within, and the interactions between, the three pillars of sustainable development under various fisheries policy settings. This is a follow-up and more detailed study to the work started in the publication on Fisheries Market Liberalisation.
Environmental, economic and social issues and effects of IUU/FOC fishing activities
This Study provides policy makers with environmental, economic and social arguments in support of measures in relation to IUU/FOC fishing activities, including the International Plan of Action on IUU Fishing. It examines the effects of overexploitation and possible depletion of stocks as a consequence of IUU fishing and focus on the economic and social impacts of IUU/FOC, including an analysis of the conditions of competition between IUU/FOC vessels and vessels fishing consistently with adopted measures consistent with international obligations (i.e. the implicit support that non-intervention in the fisheries sector gives rise to and its impact on fisheries sustainability and the environment). Finally the Study surveys investment rules and review the rules that allow transfer and re/flagging. The publication is available under the name : Why Fish Piracy Persists: The Economics of Illegal, Unreported and Unregulated Fishing (OECD).
Examination of economic aspects relating to the transition to sustainable fisheries
This work Using Market Mechanisms to manage Fisheries: Smoothing the Path (2006) discusses how reform towards the shared objective of sustainable and responsible fisheries of fisheries management can be constructed using market-like instruments/incentives. The Study will explore the different ways Member countries have used such instruments and are dealing, or have dealt with, the inevitable tradeoffs between competing interests of stakeholders in the fishery during the reform process. Obstacles and incentives to the achievement of sustainable fisheries, including how different fishing/non-fishing interests are treated in the process, will also be subject of further analysis.
The following studies have been approved by the Committee for Fisheries and are publications available for purchase through the OECD Online Bookshop.
1. Fisheries Management Costs, 2002
Improving the management of fisheries continues to be an important priority for governments. However, governments have increasingly recognised that fisheries management is not an inexpensive activity. In an era of declining budgets, governments are seeking more efficient and cost-effective means of delivering fisheries services. These developments raise a number of significant policy questions. How much do governments spend on managing fisheries? Who pays for the fisheries management services? Who actually delivers the services? How effective are the services in meeting their objectives?
These questions are addressed in this report which examines the costs of managing fisheries in OECD countries. Each year, OECD governments spend around USD 2.5 billion in managing their fisheries, accounting for nearly 40% of the total transfers made by governments to the fisheries sector. The report has found that there is an increasing application of cost-recovery and user-charging principles in OECD countries. In addition, the provision of some research, management and enforcement functions by the private sector is becoming more common as governments seek to improve the cost-effectiveness of fisheries management.
2. Liberalizing Fisheries Markets: Scope and Effects, 2002
Over the past several decades, the fishing sector has experienced dramatic changes. Production and trade have increased considerably. The relative importance of developing countries has grown as they expanded their fishing efforts and as a result of over-fishing in OECD countries. Aquaculture production has expanded significantly. And many of the stocks of fish species in international trade are either fully or over-exploited while a number of other stocks are depleted or recovering.
The purpose of this Study is to explore world and regional fish trade flows, issues and problems. The Study, published in March 2003, include an analysis of how fisheries trade and production are likely to be affected by reductions in present tariff levels and by changes in non-tariff barriers. In addition, the study will explore the effects of changes in restrictions on investments, access to services, subsidies in the fisheries sector, as well as other relevant factors.
Previous rounds of multilateral trade negotiations have produced positive outcomes for the trade in fish products. However, there remain a number of market measures that can hinder trade. Is there scope for further liberalization in the world fisheries sector? What are the key trade and market measures on which policy attention should be focused? What will further trade liberalization mean for the sustainability of fish resources? This publication reviews the significant changes that have taken place in the world fisheries sector and provides an in-depth analysis of the prospects for and potential effects of further market liberalization in the sector. It also contains an inventory of market measures and policies in place in OECD countries. A principal outcome of the study is that there is room for further market liberalization in the trade in fish and fish products.
3. Fisheries Sustainability Indicators, 2002
This study, which is included in the Review of Fisheries as a special chapter, seeks to develop economic and social fisheries sustainability indicators to be used as tools in policy analysis.
4. Transition to Responsible Fisheries, 2000
From 1997 to 2000 the Committee for Fisheries main thematic work revolved around assessing the costs associated with the transition towards sustainable fisheries and the long term benefits of such a change. Recognizing the increasing importance of responsible fisheries (signified for example by the FAO Member countries' adoption of the FAO Code of Conduct for Responsible Fisheries), the Committee observed that a transition towards that ultimate objective would entail financial impacts on fishers, on the fishing industry and on the society as a whole during the transition period.
The Study, published as " Transition to Responsible Fisheries - Economic and Policy Implications", was finalised in Spring 2000. It has four main components:
1. Fisheries labour and adjustment to responsible fisheries;
2. Post harvesting practices and responsible fisheries;
3. Government financial transfers and resource sustainability;
4. Modeling the transition to responsible fisheries.
This Study is complemented by a Statement synthesizing the main findings and results from the analysis.
5. Towards Sustainable Fisheries, 1997
Prior to embarking on the Transition to Responsible Fisheries study, the Committee was assisted by an Expert Group to deepen its comprehension of the economic aspects of fisheries management. In fact, having noted that all measures applied in fisheries take effect against the background of the fisheries management system in place, the Committee decided to carry out more in-depth work on the economic aspects of fisheries management.
The subsequent study, published in 1997 under the title " Towards Sustainable Fisheries - Economic Aspects of the Management of Living Marine resources", successfully assesses the likely consequences of different management approaches from an economic perspective. Based on Member countries' management performance, the fisheries management outcomes were assessed in biological, economic and administrative terms.
Unique in terms of its coverage and in-depth analysis, the Committee adopted a Statement enumerating the main conclusions that could be drawn from the Study. The key concluding observations were that there is no universal solution to the problems facing fisheries. Instead, the appropriate combination of management instruments should take account of the unique combination of biological, technological, economic and social characteristics making up each fishery.
6. Other
During 1995 and 1996 the Committee for Fisheries considered various aspects concerning the interface between the coastal zone and fishing and aquaculture interests. The result of this work, published in 1996 under the title "Reconciling Pressures on the Coastal Zone - Fisheries and Aquaculture", contains a number of country experiences from which it was possible to deduct general observations on two themes:
1. Resource user conflicts in the coastal zone; and
2. Coastal zone responses to changing fishing possibilities.
Also, in the early 1990s the Committee invested a serious effort in understanding the linkages between financial transfers either emanating directly from public coffers or indirectly through market price support mechanisms. This work was an important contribution to furthering the understanding of particulartrade policy aspects inherent in a natural resource like fisheries. All documents presented for this study are available free of charge from the website.
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