Chile’s senate has voted a new fishing quota bill into law.
With 38 votes in favor and one abstention, the senate approved the recommendations offered by a congressional joint committee formed to establish new fishing quotas between the industrial sector and artisanal fishers. The lower house of congress approved the bill one day before with 122 votes in favor, 15 against, and two abstentions.
The previous Chilean fishing law, enacted in 2013 and originally set to last until 2032, handed control of the vast majority of Chile’s fishing quotas to a handful of large-scale private fishing firms – a move that the current government under President Gabriel Boric deemed was “illegitimate and illegal.” In response, Boric has sought to introduce legislation to level the playing field, reducing quotas allocated to industrial fishing firms and increasing artisanal quotas.
Under the new law, the nation’s congress approved the following:
1. Anchovy: In the maritime area comprising Chile’s northern regions of Arica and Parinacota, Tarapacá, Antofagasta, Atacama, and Coquimbo, the catch quota to be established will range between 55 percent and 85 percent for the artisanal fishing sector and 15 percent to 45 percent for the industrial fishing sector, with an initial percentage of 55 percent for the artisanal sector and 45 percent for the industrial sector. If the industrial sector fails to meet the effective catch assigned, the quota destined to the artisanal fishing sector may increase by 10 percentage points per year. If the industrial sector reaches its effective annual catch allocation, it may maintain its initial percentage or have it increased by up to 10 percentage points per year.
2. Spanish sardines: In the maritime area comprising the regions of Arica and Parinacota, Tarapacá, Antofagasta, Atacama, and Coquimbo, the catch quota to be established will range between 55 percent and 85 for the artisanal fishing sector and 15 percent to 45 percent for the industrial fishing sector, with an initial percentage of 55 percent for the artisanal sector and 45 percent for the industrial sector. Again, if the industrial sector fails to meet the effective catch assigned, the quota destined to the artisanal fishing sector may increase by 10 percentage points per year. If the industrial sector reaches its effective annual catch allocation, it may maintain its initial percentage or have it increased by up to 10 percentage points per year.
3. Common hake: In the maritime area between Chile’s central-southern regions of Coquimbo, Valparaíso, Libertador General Bernardo O'Higgins, Maule, Ñuble, Biobío, La Araucanía, Los Ríos, and Los Lagos, if the global annual catch quota set is equal to or less than 35,020 MT, the applicable quota will be 45 percent for the artisanal fishing sector and 55 percent for the industrial fishing sector. When the overall catch quota set for a year is greater than 35,020 MT, the excess shall go entirely to the artisanal fraction.
4. Bream: The law calls for a “maximum sustained yield” in the bream catch quota, with an annual variation of no more than 5 percent with respect to the catch quota of the previous year.
The newly minted law has quickly drawn detractors.
Chilean industrial fishing company Landes filed legal action against the government while the law was still being crafted for what it claimed is “covert expropriation,” asserting that the technical, financial, and regulatory impact reports – required by current regulations to ensure the legality and constitutionality of any bill – never took place during the preparation of setting the new quotas.
Also while the law was being crafted, Blumar CEO Gerardo Balbontín said it was “a very bad law that is based on a purely ideological principle.”
“Acquired rights are being violated,” he said.
Additionally, Felipe Sandoval, the president of the Chilean National Fisheries Society (Sonapesca), said that approving the new law to override the existing one sets a dangerous precedent and affects private investment. The agreement involves the transfer of 489,000 metric tons (MT) of marine resources – valued at USD 160 million (EUR 139.3 million) a year – from the industrial to the artisanal sector, Sonapesca asserts.
As soon as the law passed the lower house, fishing firm Camanchaca said it would resort to legal recourse, questioning not just the lower quotas for the industrial sector but also a newly introduced tariff on the purchase of international quotas.
“The fishing industry has been hit hard by this law that introduces these changes seven years earlier than that foreseen under the current law, which entails enormous economic damage. In the case of companies in Biobío, this is double because they will have to pay a tariff of more than 30 percent on imports of foreign quotas of horse mackerel,” Camanchaca CEO Ricardo García said. “The effect will be directly on the level of activity, employment, and income taxes generated today by the most labor-intensive segment of the sector.”
The double burden of reduced quotas and increased tariffs will significantly affect the dynamism of the regional fishing industry, he added.
“The combination of both factors will inevitably slow down sector development, with a more severe impact on the Biobío region, which is the industrial heart of Chilean fishing. In the case of Camanchaca, it will mean a drop of more than 20 percent in the production of horse mackerel for human consumption, and that lower volume [contributes] directly to the loss of industrialization and regional employment,” he said. “The situation is aggravated by the contracts that Camanchaca has signed with foreign parties for the purchase of international quotas, which did not consider any type of tax and which means putting Chilean production at risk. It is unacceptable that what the law established more than 12 years ago has changed, with severe damage and without fair compensation. Serious property damage has been caused, and demanding compensation is the right thing to do.”
