U.S. senators used a subcommittee hearing to heavily criticize illegal, unregulated, and unreported (IUU) fishing practices – an activity they claimed reduces revenue for America’s seafood sector and poses a direct national security threat to the country.
“It is estimated that IUU fishing accounts for up to 20 percent of the global catch, which translates to global losses between USD 10 billion and USD 50 billion [EUR 8.7 billion to EUR 43.4 billion] annually for fishing fleets that actually fish legally like ours in America,” U.S. Senator Dan Sullivan (R-Alaska) said in the recent Senate Subcommittee on Coast Guard, Maritime, and Fisheries hearing.
Sullivan has been a frequent critic of Russia's and China’s distant-water fishing fleets, pushing hard for the U.S. to ban or severely limit seafood imports from either country. Sullivan collaborated with former U.S. President Joe Biden to close a loophole that allowed Russian seafood processed in China to be imported to the U.S. and, earlier this year, pressured Trump nominee Howard Lutnick, who now leads the U.S. Department of Commerce, to “promote American ‘freedom fish,’ Alaska ‘freedom fish,’ and [not] allow communist fish from Russia and China coming into our markets.”
During the 12 June hearing, Sullivan again lambasted China’s distant-water fishing fleet.
“Of course, the Chinese Communist Party in China plays a significant role in this problem in the global fishing industry and is the worst offender of IUU fishing by far, no surprise. The Chinese government has provided billions of dollars in subsidies to its distant-water fishing fleets, gray fleets as we sometimes call them, enabling their fishing sector to grow exponentially,” Sullivan said. “According to Global Fishing Watch, China operates approximately 57,000 fishing vessels, which accounts for 44 percent of the world's total fishing activity, operating in tandem with the Chinese military to protect its fishing fleet.”
U.S. Senator Ted Cruz (R-Texas) highlighted reporting released by the Outlaw Ocean Project, which unveiled evidence of labor abuse, unsafe conditions, and other violations in China’s distant-water fleet.
“Many of these Chinese vessels exploit crews through forced labor, unsafe conditions, and wage theft,” Cruz said. “Crew members are held against their will, denied basic human rights, and even subjected to physical violence. This is not competition. It is barbaric economic warfare. Let me be clear: Our waters are not open to poachers.”
China recently ratified the Port State Measures Agreement (PSMA), an international agreement to tackle IUU fishing, hasn’t seemed to dampen any concerns.
“I don't think anybody actually believes that China is going to enforce the rules of the PSMA, particularly for Chinese-flagged vessels that are bringing illegal catch back to China, but it gives the U.S. a great tool to name and shame Beijing and try to hold its feet to the fire internationally,” said Gregory Poling, who is the director and senior fellow of the Southeast Asia Program and Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative at the Center for Strategic & International Studies (CSIS) as well as a witness at the hearing.
While China’s fleet received the brunt of the hearing’s criticism ...
