China, the United States and South Korea devote the most money to subsidising fishing, according to a report published on Wednesday 11 January by the European Commission.
In each of these three countries, over 95% of the subsidies go to the catching sub-sector, the report says. It seeks to provide a review of the level of public aid granted by the EU’s largest competitors in fishing: Japan, South Korea, China, Russia, Taiwan and the United States.
The EU submitted a proposal to the World Trade Organisation (WTO) at the end of 2016 seeking to relaunch talks on fisheries subsidies with the goal of ending aid which increases the fish-catching capacity of the fleets and aid granted to fishermen who engage in illegal, unregulated and undeclared (IUU) fishing (see EUROPE 11647).
China’s €5.5 billion. Wednesday’s report indicates, for example, that China devotes an annual average of €5.56 billion to subsidies for fishing (the United States gives $1.5 billion). Chinese subsidies to the sector equate to 17% of the value produced and fuel subsidies amount to almost 90% of the aid.
South Korea €770 per tonne. The report says that subsidies to the catching sub-sector per tonne of catch are highest in South Korea (€770 per tonne in 2013), the US (€379 per tonne in 2012) and Japan (€170 per tonne in 2015).
Russia has the highest per tonne subsidy for aquaculture. Almost 33% of all subsidies granted by Russia in 2015 (€91 million in 2015) went to the fish-farming sub-sector. Subsidies for the marketing and processing sectors are small in all countries studied.
The report highlights that country submissions to the WTO are not periodic and “lack a systematic template for reporting subsidies across countries”. It argues, additionally, that the reporting of subsidies data should be consistent across countries, pointing out, for example, that fuel subsidies appear to be published regularly only for some countries. (Original version in French by Lionel Changeur)