The oceans are important for our food supply, but they are overfished. To halt this trend and strengthen local fishers, the global community is now taking action against illegal fishing.
Jan Rübel is author at Zeitenspiegel Reportagen, a columnist at Yahoo and writes for national newspapers and magazines. He studied History and Middle Eastern Studies.
Richard Yeboah has just got back to his office. “The last inspection went well”, he says over the phone, “there was no indication of an offence”. He had been on a trawler full of caught fish. “Not overloaded, and the fish were from waters that are not overfished.” Other things Yeboah’s team checked and found to be in good order included the ship’s engine and the working conditions of its crew – so the ship was given the green light to unload and refuel in Tema, a port on the coast of Ghana.
Richard Yeboah is an inspector. As a member of Ports Task Force Ghana, he tackles a major issue: illegal fishing harms the West African country in a wide variety of ways. Industrial fishing boats not only displace smaller fishers, they also deplete fish stocks, destroy biodiversity and make “blue growth”, the use of aquatic habitats as a source of sustainable nutrition for humans, more difficult.
In light of rising population figures this poses a serious challenge. Ghana’s waters are still rich in fish, but the country increasingly depends on imported seafood because floating metal giants flout rules and regulations and employ a “might is right” approach out on the ocean. Precise figures are hard to come by, but global damage from illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing is estimated at 23.5 billion dollars each year. The United Nations believe that two thirds of global stocks are already overfished and one third are declining. This is hardly blue growth. Those working to end mass fishing are faced with impenetrable structures that often have ties to international organised crime. Some trawlers not only encroach on ecosystems, but are also used to smuggle drugs or people or to covertly transport illegal wildlife products. IUU fishing is disastrous for the global fight against hunger, as according to estimates by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) fishing and aquaculture secure the livelihoods of between ten and twelve percent of the world’s population.
But there is a way to stop this trend. Every ship has to return to port sometime. Fish can be secretly transshipped on the high seas, but at some point it has to be brought to shore. And ships need to be refuelled or repaired. This is where the Port States Measures Agreement (PSMA) – an internationally binding, FAO-initiated treaty between port states that entered into force in 2016 and aims to curb illegal fishing – comes into play. Ghana is one of the parties to the PSMA. After the European Union (EU) issued a warning to the country in 2013 due to its overly lax controls, the authorities began to rethink their approach. Enter Richard Yeboah of the Fisheries Commission in Accra and the local task force: since 2018, this inter-agency unit has worked to put an end to overfishing. “At first it was difficult to bring all the involved state actors together”, says Yeboah, “but we are learning every day, and we are making significant progress.”
“Stop Illegal Fishing” (SIF) supports and advises the task force in Ghana in its work – with the help of GIZ, among others, and on behalf of the BMZ. “Non-sustainable fishing is a growing threat for developing countries”, says Friederike Sorg of GIZ. “GIZ works to preserve wild fish stocks and thus to protect incomes, food supply and economic growth.”
The three-year project operates not only in Ghana, but also in Madagascar and Mozambique. When inspectors board a ship for checks, JD Kotze often accompanies them from his desk in Cape Town, South Africa. The inspectors wear small cameras known as body cams. And JD Kotze isn’t just anybody: a former police officer, he has led special operations units in South Africa, hunted down rapists and serial killers, and became involved in investigating illegal fishing when he broke up the largest fish smuggling ring to date, ending in the arrest of the minister for development of the Cape Town region. “The idea to use body cams came about due to the coronavirus pandemic”, he says. Before the global covid-19 outbreak, he travelled frequently between the three project countries, but he notes that “this digital application even makes our work more effective”.
But how does an inspection aboard ship actually work? Ships are generally required to notify ports of their arrival 72 hours in advance. The authorities then check the ship’s identity and history, its documents and licences, its crew, and whether its AIS global tracking system was deactivated at any time while the ship was at sea – a possible indication of transshipping on the open ocean or illegal fishing within a country’s twelve-mile zone. If the probability of IUU fishing is considered low, the ship is permitted to dock and given a positive endorsement. But if any irregularities or oddities emerge, the vessel is only allowed to enter the port on the condition that it is inspected. During this inspection, the ship may not avail itself of any port services. If IUU fishing is proven, the ship becomes subject to the measures to which its flag state has agreed in line with international law. “All these things can make IUU fishing more expensive”, says JD Kotze, adding that “transshipping at sea is also a cost factor.” If the ship has a documented history of IUU fishing, it can be prohibited from entering the port altogether.
The challenge in Ghana lay in convincing all involved parties to work together. “Historically, the purpose of port authorities was to create revenue for the government”, says JD Kotze, “so they weren’t keen on denying ships entry to their ports”. The police on the other hand tend to focus their crime-fighting efforts on theft, robbery and violence, he explains, and less on seemingly harmless activities like fishing. The checks around the PSMA require cooperation between multiple public authorities that had not previously worked together, followed different briefs and also have different sources of funding: alongside the Ministry of Fisheries and Aquaculture Development and the Ministry of Transport, funds are also provided by customs authorities, the marine police, the military, and health authorities. At first, back in 2018, there were certainly reservations, says Kotze: some feared making mistakes, others worried about their funding – after all, cooperation is about community. “We are collecting more and more data”, says Yeboah. “Over time, a pattern has emerged that allows us to detect illegal activity more quickly.” The authorities regularly hold round table meetings and operate a joint digital platform to exchange the collected data.
Despite the success of the PSMA as the first ever legally binding set of rules against IUU fishing, there are also a number of notable loopholes. China as one of the world’s largest fish producers has, for example, not joined the treaty yet; Chinese ships are among those operating off the West African coast, sometimes in business partnerships with Ghanaian owners. Liberia and Sierra Leone with their large fishing grounds are also not parties to the treaty. But Francisco Marí sees a positive trend. “The Ghanaian coast used to be the Wild West”, remembers the senior policy officer for world food security, agritrade and maritime affairs at German aid organisation “Brot für die Welt”. In the Soviet era alone, he says, 200 tuna vessels from the USSR trawled those waters. That was a long time ago, but the issue of overfishing is not off the table. Help comes from PSMA. "The EU regulation against IUU fishing will ensure and reinforce the reduction of imports from IUU fishing, to the extent that illegal imports are even measurable, through actions taken by states because of PSMA."
However, Marí sees a loophole in the fact that smaller boats carrying transshipped fish are able to dock at illegal ports or land on beaches. "There is also frequent transhipment to fishing boats that have legal fishing licenses and use them to fill their quotas - called 'transbordering' - and deliver the catch mixed with their legal catch to EU ports with legal papers." Flagging out, the practice of fishing operators switching ownership to so-called flag-of-convenience states with lax checks, is still common; the FAO is attempting to counter this behaviour with sanctions against those countries – so far with limited success. Flag-of-convenience states may be landlocked countries such as Bolivia or Mongolia, and some fishing boats change flags regularly. This also makes checks more complicated, especially if the flag states have not acceded to regional fishing treaties.
Marí believes one option for fighting IUU fishing is to invite the many fishers to get involved, for example by photographing, documenting and reporting illegal fishing themselves: “In Senegal, small-scale fishers call the navy themselves when they notice infractions.”
According to the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), the oceans contribute 1.5 billion US dollars in value creation to the global economy. Much remains to be done if these figures are not to drop drastically. But the global community has made a start.
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Roughly 800 million people suffer from hunger worldwide. Change is needed - for people and for the environment. Brot für die Welt reports on the starting points offered by everyone's ecological footprint and handprint.
Recycling organic waste into soil amendments and animal feed through a transdisciplinary approach – this is what the RUNRES project, launched in four sub-Saharan African countries four years ago, seeks to achieve. Three of the project's scientists report.
Diversifying our protein supply to include plant-based foods and cultivated meat can be a game-changer for climate mitigation and climate adaptation, especially in the countries of the Global South. However, a great deal of research is still required to capitalise on this potential. And political support, as Ivo Rzegotta, Good Food Institute, demonstrates.
The textile industry contributes significantly to environmental pollution as it produces over 100 billion garments every year, resulting in huge CO2 emissions and water consumption. Fashion designer Paul Kadjo uses banana silk as an environmentally friendly alternative to make textile production more environmentally conscious and socially just.
The Nyayo Tea Zones Development Corporation is committed to the preservation of forests in Kenya: The establishment of so-called buffer zones counteracts deforestation by planting trees and tea. In addition to the production of environmentally friendly tea, the project benefits the resources of the forests and the livelihoods of the communities living near the forests, says project manager Wallace Gichunge.
A world without hunger and with sufficient healthy food as well as climate-friendly agriculture can only be achieved if ideas are transformed into innovations and ultimately also applied - a conversation with BMZ Head of Division Sebastian Lesch on the Innovation Challenge programme of the new Agricultural Innovation Fund.
The United Nations plan a Food Systems Summit - and now the Corona-Virus is dictating the agenda. The Chief Economist of the UN World Food Programme takes stock of the current situation: a conversation with Jan Rübel about pandemics, about the chromosomes of development - and about the conflicts that inhibit them.
In Togo’s capital, Lomé, home-grown rice costs almost twice as much as the imported product from Thailand. Yet there are good reasons for preferring the local product
Happy youngsters in rural areas, green development and the connection to the digital age – professor Joachim von Braun believes in this future sceneraio for Africa. For three decades the agricultural scienties has been researching how politics can create prosperty on the continent.
By leasing a three hundred hectare fruit plantation in Ethiopia, Lutz Hartmann has realised a long-cherished dream: to run his own business in Africa. Now he has a personal interest in the issue of Africa’s development.
Small holders around the world are often forced to sell their harvests below market value due to a lack of market and pricing information. A new app by the UN World Food Programme (WFP) is going to change this.
It is 2080. We are on a farm somewhere in Africa. Everything is digital. The blockchain is an omnipotent point of reference, and the farm is flourishing. But then, everything goes wrong. A dystopian short story, written exclusively for SEWOH.
Lack of seasonal workers and virus explosion in slaughterhouses, rising vegetable prices, climate crisis – all this demonstrates: Our food system is highly productive and (at least for the rich inhabitants of planet earth) guarantees an unprecedented rich and steady food supply - but it is not resilient.
At the beginning of December 2018, AGRA's board of directors met in Berlin. The "Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa" panel discussed the next steps in their policy of modernizing agriculture. How to go on in the next ten years? One question - many answers from experts.
The soybean is a natural crop that can be used to make a lot of food. So, Tata Bi started a small processing business first on her own, then with a few other women, which provides the women with an additional source of income year-round besides selling the soybeans.
Chancellor Merkel has begun an ambitious European political programme: Striving for compromise in budget negotiations, an orderly Brexit as well as an appropriate response to the corona crisis. Unfortunately, one of her positions that she previously held is nowhere to be found: Africa's prosperity is in the interest of Europe.
Africa has a huge opportunity to make agriculture its economic driver. However, the potential for this is far from being made exhaustive use of, one reason being that women face considerable difficulties in their economic activities. The organisation AWAN Afrika seeks to change this state of affairs.
The region of Sub-Saharan Africa is on the decisive verge of a great development boost in farming: it could skip entire generations of technological development. But how? About possible roles and potentials of digital services.
The WWF has published a sensational study on food waste. The focus: farm-stage food waste. Peter McFeely, Global head of communications and strategic planning at WWF, explains what needs to be done.
Whether it's banana bread made from brown bananas, conscious shopping plans or foodsharing, we give you five tips on how to reduce your everyday food waste.
On the podcast ‘From the Field to the Shelf’, Marie Nasemann calls for new attempts to promote fair fashion. An evening about burnt returns, filterless washing machines and a lot of room for improvement.
The global trade in spices currently has a volume of over 10 billion euros. But at what price do these spices refine our Christmas cuisine? On closer inspection, aspects of the value chain leave a bitter taste.
Saskia Widenhorn, Head of the Cotton Component in Cameroon and the Sub-Saharan Cotton Initiative at GIZ, reports on the Bremer Cotton Week, which brought together international industry experts. The agenda included supply chain transparency, sustainability and new forms of cooperation between the private sector and partner countries.
Protectionist policies like tariffs supposedly protect domestic producers if they cannot compete with cheaper imported products. Some African countries have therefore opted to impose such import restrictions for a number of products. For the case of chicken imports in Ghana, this study analyses whether restrictions would lead to overall positive or negative welfare effects among households.
Kenya is a large importer of vetable oils mainly from Indonesia and Malaysia - amongst them sunflower oil. Due to the Russian war of aggression against Ukraine, there were supply bottlenecks and food shortages, leading to less affordable vegetable oils in Kenya. As a response to the lack of supply, the Sanga'alo Institute of Science and Technology, took that impulse, teamed up with the GIZ and established regional cultivation and refinement of sunflowers.
Organic cotton is extremely popular – but farmers still find it difficult to change their conventional cultivation methods. A new project addresses this dilemma: Bundesliga football teams in Germany are promoting the switch to organic cotton in India. And thereby setting an example.
The complex interrelationships of the sustainable transformation of agricultural and food systems are not always easy to understand - the Agri-Food Map, an interactive online app, makes the comprehensive relations accessible by providing a wide range of comprehensibly prepared information.
The consequences of the Russian invasion of Ukraine have enabled many countries to open up new export markets for their agricultural goods. However, smallholder farms have been largely left out. Drawing on his experience in India, our author gives a brief overview of how this can be changed.
From measures to promote biodiversity in Germany to more sustainable cocoa cultivation methods in Ecuador: WWF works at many different levels. At the Green Week, it will be demonstrated just how multifaceted nature conservation work is and what role each individual's decision plays.
A Contribution by Initiative für nachhaltige Agrarlieferketten (INA)
The demand for sustainable products and supply chains is constantly increasing. DIASCA is an alliance that works on interoperability of digital solutions in agricultural supply chains through the development of open standards for forest monitoring, farm income and traceability.
Female founder Ebun Feludu wants to bring the coconut value chain to Nigeria with her start-up Kokari. In this interview, she explains why she envisions every coconut palm tree bearing its own name in the future and how digitalization can contribute to this.
Allan Mubiru was standing in front of a shelf in Kigali, Rwanda, and discovered a local type of coffee. He took it, tasted it and was thrilled. A story about a grocery shopping trip that became the beginning of a successful business idea.
Interview with Bernadette Arakwiye und Salima Mahamoudou (World Resources Institute)
Deforestation is leading to a shortage of ressources. What are the options for counteracting? A conversation with Bernadette Arakwiye and Salima Mahamoudou about renaturation and the possibilities of artificial intelligence.
An Interview with Francisco Marí (Brot für die Welt)
Brot für die Welt (Bread for the World) did not attend the UNFSS pre-summit. Instead, the organisation took part in a counter-summit that took place at the same time. A conversation with Francisco Marí about the reasons, the process - and an outlook for the future
Vertically growing plants, magnetic cotton. Hairy leftovers fertilizing fields, tractors running on algae? These six innovations could lead agriculture’s next Green Revolution!
At the climate conference in Glasgow, activists from various groups protested again – Leonie Bremer from ‘Fridays for Future’ was there too. How can climate protection and development cooperation work hand in hand?
A conversation with aquatic researcher Shakuntala Thilsted on the long-neglected nutrition benefits of aquatic diets and the empowering qualities of a sustainable aqua-food systems transformation.
A Contribution by Adrian Muller, Catherine Pfeifer and Jürn Sanders (FiBL)
Taking Biodiversity Focus Areas under production or abandoning lower yielding, more extensive production systems is the wrong approach to mastering the looming global food crisis, say the authors of the Research Institute of Organic Agriculture (FiBL).
Germany joins the international Agroecology Coalition, reinforcing its commitment to fair, sustainable agriculture and ensuring the future viability of rural areas. By adopting a holistic approach, agroecology is helping to address the greatest challenges of our time: protecting the climate, combating hunger and preserving biodiversity.
The production of animal-source foods is becoming increasingly difficult due to the impact of climate change on the livestock sector in Africa. Though, Livestock make a crucial contribution to food security in Africa. Three papers by the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ), GIZ, ILRI and World Bank analyze, how Africas future livestock sector can look like.
Agriculture is coming under pressure worldwide: bacteria, viruses and insects are causing problems for crops. In Palestine, Dr. Rana Samara from the Palestinian Academy of Science and Technology is researching solutions to the problem. And she finds them in nature itself.
What do chocolate, carrots and tequila have in common? What sounds like the ingredients for an experimental cocktail are foods that would not exist without certain animal species. They are examples of how nature works for us every day, often behind the scenes.
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