The Central African nation of Gabon announced intentions earlier this summer to withdraw from its 18-year-old sustainable fisheries partnership agreement (SFPA) with the European Union on allegations the deal is imbalanced and lacks transparency.
Though Gabon has been very vocal about terminating the SFPA, it has yet to file a formal notice of withdrawal from the deal, leading some to believe that the nation is simply trying to strengthen its position when the deal will undergo negotiations starting this fall.
The SFPA between Gabon and the E.U. was originally signed in June 2007 and lasted until June 2013. It has been automatically renewed for six-year periods since then, with the current fisheries protocol covering the period from June 2021 to June 2026.
Under the current agreement, 37 tuna seiners, trawlers, and pole-and-line vessels from France and Spain are allowed to catch up to 32,000 metric tons of tuna in Gabon's waters every year in exchange for an annual financial contribution from the E.U. of EUR 2.6 million (USD 3 million).
Gabon has claimed that the deal is lopsided, with European vessels raking in heavy profits while Gabon receives limited monetary returns and suffers environmental harm from overfishing.
Gabonese officials are not the first to raise gripes with SFPA frameworks.
A recent report from a group of environmental NGOs said that transparency failures and limited public access to critical data are just a few of several reasons why it is essential to reform the E.U.’s SFPAs.
The E.U. IUU Fishing Coalition, comprising the NGOs Oceana, the Environmental Justice Foundation (EJF), The Pew Charitable Trusts, and WWF, told SeafoodSource last month that current SFPAs and their accompanying protocols lack explicit provisions to actually deal with non-compliance or partial adherence to their transparency clauses.
“The European Commission has a duty to ensure these agreements are truly mutually beneficial and coastal communities must be consulted,” E.U. IUU Fishing Coalition Coordinator Tom Walsh said. “In practice, tangible benefits from SFPAs are often unseen in partner countries; this must change.”
Still, Europêche Tuna Director Anne-France Mattlet told SeafoodSource that a complete withdrawal from SFPAs, like Gabon is threatening, “would have severe consequences for both the E.U. fleet and the broader tuna supply chain.”
She explained that termination of the agreements “would disrupt access to critical fishing grounds, preventing E.U. vessels from following the migration of tuna and supplying both African canneries and the E.U. market with sustainably sourced tuna.”
“This would create a vacuum in the region that would likely be filled by non-E.U. industrial fleets, often owned by Asian interests, which typically do not adhere to the same sustainability standards and may lack proper oversight from their flag states,” she said.
Anne-France also said “the termination would harm E.U. coastal economies, especially in Spain and France, where jobs in fishing, transport, and processing are directly linked to these agreements.”
Coalition for Fair Fisheries Arrangements (CFFA) Coordinator Beatrice Gorez agreed that there are more effective options than simply withdrawing from the deal, even though Gabon has legitimate gripes.
“The claim of unfairness in fisheries agreements is what we hear from most countries that have signed protocols with the E.U., but for us, the root problem with these deals can better be looked into at a regional level. In the case of Gabon, it could be by a regional organization such as the International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tunas [ICCAT],” she said. “ICCAT members need to get together and review the basis upon which the fisheries resources are being allocated and seek alternatives that give more benefits to countries providing access to E.U. fleets in terms of providing jobs, ensuring food security, and promoting sustainability.”
Gorez also said that proposals Gabon has considered inserting into a new SFPA may also be ineffectual.
For example, Gorez said she doubted the viability of Gabon’s proposal for more local processing of tuna catch, saying the country's ports “do not have the capacity to administer and manage huge tuna vessels as this requires specific equipment and infrastructure such as cranes and cold storage, which are requirements that are unlikely to be developed in the country within six months.”
“Gabon and other countries that have signed fisheries agreements with the E.U. need to look at the deals beyond three years to allow for the development of necessary infrastructure to support local processing,” she said.
