US-led group’s demands should be ignored
The recent move by a US-led group called ‘Friends of Fishing' (FoF), seeking a ban on subsidies provided to illegal, unregulated and unreported fishing (IUU), will seriously hurt the fishing community in India. India has officially registered a complaint with the World Trade Organisation against the proposal mooted by a group of nations, under the FoF banner. India pays huge subsidies to its fisherfolk across various levels, ranging from the Central, State and the Union Territories, which amounted to Rs284 crore in 2014-15. In fact, this subsidy has been given with a view to “protect and secure the livelihood of traditional and poor fishing communities”.
What led the FoF to set a deadline for the mounting IUU, is that there has been a massive rise of demand from fish-consumers across the globe, unlike in the past. But what worries the group is that countries like India are at the forefront in the race to scale up the IUU. And, to the FoF, this will severely reduce the global fish reserves, and certainly affect the huge fishing business, regulated under the international law. It is ironical that, while focussing on Indian subsidies on the IUU, the FoF is simply ignoring similar subsidies regularly given by developed nations like the US. India, while committing to norms at the multilateral level, must see to it that the best of the interests of its fishermen are well-protected. However, if a ban comes on the fishery subsidy schemes, States like Tamil Nadu, Maharashtra, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Gujarat, Goa and the Union Territories of Andaman & Nicobar Islands, Daman & Diu and lakshadweep, will be badly affected.
The IUU needs to be viewed from the perspective of traceable and transparent fishing, while considering the livelihood of a large fishing community in India. Governments, and groups led by the US, simply gearing up against the IUU in the Indian Ocean, will not solve livelihood issues of fishermen in the country. It has also been observed that for long, the FoF has been stressing on the mass-level impact of the IUU on the social, economic and ecological environment in the Indian Ocean. But then, for ages, these areas have been the traditional hunting ground of the fisherfolk, as they have a rich reservoir.
Also, there were not too many options available to the locals in those days. Still, a proposed ban on the IUU due to fish scarcity globally, was never under consideration. But, today, when we have hundreds of substitutes available for fish, and there has been a surge of domestic fish-farming, naturally the pressure on the IUU in the sea-front gets lessened to a great extent. Therefore, if India gives subsidies to its fishing community, it should not be an issue of global concern — certainly not the way it has been highlighted by the FoF. Moreover, subsidies flow to either homeless or poor fishermen with a registered boat, and having membership in the fishing cooperatives. India cannot simply ignore them.