HoDs-Level meeting on Article on Overcapacity and Overfishing and Special & Differential Treatment
Statement by U.S. Ambassador Dennis C. Shea (excerpts)
We have listened carefully to the interventions today, some of which are not encouraging. We continue to see wide divergences in position – including with some Members categorically rejecting objective sustainability criteria in our discipline despite our clear sustainability mandate. This speaks volumes to the need for a capping approach as the solution. In other words, with some unwilling to eliminate obviously harmful subsidies, let’s look at reducing the numbers.
Capping would provide the flexibility that Members continue to call for, as needed to allow Members to sustainably develop their fisheries sectors, while limiting and reducing the provision of harmful fisheries subsidies. We urge you, Chair, to give appropriate time to discussion of the capping approach, including filling in the placeholder currently in the revised consolidated text.
Turning to your questions for this session, we do believe that you have asked the right question, which was whether there are any Members here who categorically assert the right to subsidize unsustainable fishing. Based on what we heard this morning, it remains unclear. It might be a question of language, or burden of proof. If we have misunderstood, and at least some Members are not opposed to considering sustainability, what is the sustainability test to which those Members are willing to submit?
At the same time, it seems other Members wish to give themselves wide berth to avoid any sustainability accountability. If this is the case, then your text should clearly show two options for future high-level decision-making on the approach that will garner consensus.
With respect to the drafting of the general prohibition on subsidies to fishing that contribute to overcapacity and overfishing, we agree with what was expressed by others, in terms of bringing the sustainability test back as an objective threshold for what is meant when we refer to “contributing to overcapacity and overfishing.” We believe this prior approach, which included reference to the rate of fishing and fishing capacity, is an important standard to clearly include as a threshold issue in the text of the general prohibition. We also agree with others that the inclusion of sustainability language presents a good faith effort to strike a balance and give Members policy space.
As to the list of subsidies in this article, this must be an open, illustrative list, as others have noted. A closed list lends itself to calls for exceptions and exclusions, which will take us even further away from making progress on this discipline.
Regarding any special and differential treatment when it comes to this overcapacity and overfishing area, Chair, you have again asked the right questions. Members have indicated a need for appropriate and effective SDT. Members have indicated their desire to grow their fisheries in a sustainable manner. We ask those Members what measures do they have, or would they put in place, to ensure that current or future subsidization would be done in a sustainable manner? A close consideration of this issue might help to unlock roadblocks throughout this text.
Unfortunately what this conversation today has also illustrated, is that we are nowhere near knowing even some basic parameters of what “appropriate and effective SDT” would look like in a negotiation that is predicated on sustainability.
The number of hours this group has now spent on discussing SDT carve-outs, exceptions and flexibilities has been unparalleled. We doubt that doing this before we even know the disciplines, is a good use of time.
And in the context of focusing only on the most harmful of subsidies for our discipline, we question the need for any SDT. But as we have noted in the past, we are willing to consider it on a needs-based, transition-period approach, for the overfishing and overcapacity area only.
And one other point I would like to make while I have the floor: I hear Members refer to SDT as a right, an entitlement. Or that we need to account for past subsidies in a future discipline and therefore focus solely on the “polluter pays” concept. How do these assertions hold water when we are talking about the sustainability of a finite, shared natural resource? How can we all secure the livelihoods of our fishing communities, or the resources so greatly needed for food security, if harmful fisheries subsidies are provided which in turn leads to resource collapse and in essence, food insecurity? This is not only counter-intuitive, but runs against the experience of the last fifty years– and certainly nothing we should be supporting through WTO rules.
Again, we would ask the question of how wholesale carve-outs are in-line with our mandate? Furthermore, to those who are seeking SDT to grow their capacity, we ask those Members to also explain how that is in line with the mandate, particularly if these same Members are resisting any kind of sustainability threshold for such growth? Instead of destroying any possibility of a coherent agreement, why can’t we consider a more tailored approach to addressing policy space of small producers, such as that set out in our cap proposal?