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THE need for the expansion of markets and materials under hyper-capitalism has seen a renewed interest in oceans and their exploitation. The push for ocean market expansion is also happening hand in glove with the securitisation of ocean governance. Global powers including developed countries and transnational corporations, backed up by multilateral financial institutions, are all competing to obtain and secure access to a new frontier of maritime resources. 

Fisheries subsidies negotiations at the World Trade Organization Ministerial (WTO) Ministerial Conference are continuing to propose subsidy bans that are failing to hold the big distant water fishing fleets accountable. As negotiations continue past their deadline, the latest circulated draft text shows major concessions being made to the large fishing fleets, in particular the distant water fleets who are appearing to have no hard prohibitions on their subsidies. This text asks member to refrain, to the greatest extent possible to provide subsidies for distant water fishing. While there is a requirement to show that the fishing is sustainable, because there is no hard subsidy ban in place and little to hold them to account. “The current proposals are a last-minute carve out for the biggest fleets, this represents a significant failure for the negotiations despite the hard work and resolve by many developing countries and small-island developing states to hold them to account.

Today in Abu Dhabi at the World Trade Organization Ministerial Conference (MC13) fisherfolk representatives have called on the global trading body to not trade away supports for small-scale fishers.

Ministers are negotiating for prohibitions on subsidies that contribute to overfishing and overcapacity based on the Sustainable Development Goal 14.6 but they are being contested as not addressing the main culprits of overfishing.

Civil Society groups and fisherfolk representatives have traveled to Abu Dhabi to raise their concerns directly to Ministers.

• Analysis of e-commerce JSI chairs’ text of 20 February 2024, INF/ECOM/85 Rev. 1  by Jane Kelsey
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• Agriculture and food security in MC13: Going forward or backward?  by Ranja Sengupta
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• Dispute settlement reform: The informal process and the way forward after MC13  by Kinda Mohamadieh
• Commentary on the draft text of the informal discussions on dispute settlement reform

• Risks in trade as a solution for environmental problems by Abhijit Das

Here’s a roundup of the issues at stake at the upcoming ministerial:

Fishing subsidies: The WTO reached a partial agreement at its last ministerial conference in June 2022 to curb subsidies that threaten the future of ocean fish supplies.

This time they are trying for a more comprehensive agreement that would hopefully have a much bigger impact on maintaining one of the world’s most important food stocks.

Of all the issues at stake in Abu Dhabi, officials are most hopeful about getting this negotiation over the line. “If there’s no agreement on fish at MC13, that’d be a tragedy,” one Geneva-based diplomat said.

For Okonjo-Iweala, the negotiation is proof the WTO is still relevant. “260 million people depend on fisheries for their livelihood, and the oceans are being overfished. [The question for ministers in Abu Dhabi is] can we save the oceans, be part of the regenerative blue economy and save jobs?” she told POLITICO in an interview.

On February 23, 2024, small and traditional fisherfolk groups sent an open letter to the Indonesian Government regarding negotiations on a fisheries subsidy agreement at the WTO, which will prohibit subsidies for small fisherfolks in developing countries including Indonesia. In the draft WTO text currently being discussed, there are eight types of fisheries subsidies that will be prohibited because they contribute to IUU Fishing, Overcapacity and Overfishing.
Among the prohibited subsidies are fuel oil, insurance, employee costs, ship improvement subsidies, fishing technology, subsidies to support activities at sea and subsidies that cover fishing losses or fishing-related activities.

We, fisherfolks organizations and civil society groups in Indonesia are worried about the fisheries subsidy agreement at the WTO which will prohibit fisheries subsidies for small fisherfolks. In Indonesia, small fisherfolks are fishers who use fishing vessels under 10 GT and the number of small fisherfolks is 90% of the total number of fishers. It is recorded that 2.4 million fishers and 3.9 million fishers women in Indonesia will be affected by the elimination of fisheries subsidies by the WTO.
Small fishers are the most vulnerable group in the capture fisheries sector who also experience poverty and extreme poverty. So a different approach and treatment is needed for small fisherfolks in obtaining rights and protection from the state. We know that there are two pillars in this fisheries subsidy agreement that have reached conclusion, so we firmly ask the Indonesian government not to ratify the two pillars of the WTO fisheries subsidy agreement.

Nearly two years’ worth of negotiating will conclude next week at the World Trade Organization’s 13th ministerial conference in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, where trade ministers could be leaning toward agreements on fisheries subsidies and a path forward on reform issues as the fate of a moratorium on e-commerce transmission duties hangs in the balance.

The ministerial kicks off on Monday and is scheduled to run through Thursday, though it is not uncommon for ministers to extend talks if they are making progress.

Most of the optimism about negotiations this time around centers on supplementing the Agreement on Fisheries Subsidies. That deal, reached at MC12 in June 2022, did not include provisions on subsidies that contribute to overfishing and overcapacity. Addressing those types of subsidies has been a priority for members ever since.

rom February 26–29, 2024, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) will host the 13th Ministerial Conference (MC13) of the World Trade Organization (WTO). Governments from 164 countries will be joined by Timor-Leste and Comoros, the first two nations to join the group since 2017.

At stake is a fight between two visions of what role the WTO, as the world’s most powerful rule-making body in the global economy, should play.

Should the institution expand as an even more corporate-influenced body, with rich countries allowed to set agendas, impose negotiation mechanisms in their favor, and leave poorer countries — and multilateralism itself — in the dustbin of history?

Or should members of the institution recognize the constraints that the current rules place on developing economies, including the harm caused to workers, farmers, and the global environment, and increase flexibilities so that these countries can use trade for their development?

Ministerial Declaration