DDG Ellard: Accepting fish subsidies agreement can give boost to global trading system

Thank you, Marion, distinguished ladies, and gentlemen.

Thank you to the OECD Secretariat for inviting me to today's launch of the 2025 edition of the OECD Review of Fisheries. As with previous editions, this year's report brings together and analyses a broad range of valuable data on the health of our fish resources, fisheries management systems, and government support policies. The invaluable resource highlights some of the key threats and challenges facing the fisheries sector, and also identifies possible solutions and opportunities for improving its economic and environmental sustainability.

As the report makes clear, fisheries management regimes and public support measures, when guided by informed decision-making, have the potential to work as two sides of the same coin, complementing each other to ensure that our oceans continue to serve the millions of fishers around the world whose livelihoods depend upon their health.

By adopting the Agreement on Fisheries Subsidies in June 2022, WTO Members took one important step in this direction. As many of you are aware, the landmark Agreement on Fisheries Subsidies prohibits subsidies to fishing activities considered to be among the most harmful to the sustainability of our oceans, including subsidies to vessels involved in illegal, unreported, and unregulated (IUU) fishing, and fishing of overfished stocks. The 2025 Review of Fisheries recognizes that the provision of subsidies for such activities is among the major challenges facing sustainable fisheries practices. The Agreement on Fisheries Subsidies offers WTO Members a powerful tool to address this devastating and accelerating problem.

However, the AFS will begin to deliver its benefits for sustainable fisheries only when it enters into force, which requires two-thirds of WTO Members (111) to deposit their instruments of acceptance.

To date, 89 Members have done so, leaving us with only 22 ratifications left for the Agreement to enter into force.

WTO Members have set the ambitious goal of achieving this objective as soon as possible. What a thrill it would be to celebrate the entry into force of the Agreement on Fisheries Subsidies with the international ocean community at the UN Ocean Conference in June – that's our goal.

Almost all OECD Members, and a good share of its accession candidate countries and key partners, have already ratified the Agreement. But not all of you have done so. So, I urge those that have not yet deposited their instruments of acceptance to accelerate as much as possible your domestic ratification processes and join your fellow Members and partners that have already ratified. And I urge those of you that have finished to serve as a helpful source of information and assistance to those who have not.

Depositing your instruments of acceptance will not only demonstrate your commitment to the sustainability of our oceans, but it will also serve as an important boost to the multilateral trading system at an important and challenging time.

Entry into force of the Agreement will also unlock access to technical assistance and capacity-building provided through the WTO Fish Fund for the developing country Members that have ratified the Agreement. Thanks to the significant financial support of our Members, the WTO Fish Fund is now ready to become fully operational upon entry into force. And I take this opportunity to sincerely thank OECD Members for their generous contributions to this Fund, which represent more than 90% of the near USD 15 million in donations and pledges received so far.

But our work does not end with the entry into force of the Agreement on Fisheries Subsidies. As you know, WTO Members are engaging in a second wave of negotiations with a view to agreeing on a set of additional disciplines regulating subsidies that are generally considered to contribute to overcapacity and overfishing.

The extraordinary work of OECD Members and its Secretariat in producing the 2025 and previous editions of the Review of Fisheries report, and especially the Fisheries Support Estimates, has been welcomed and is helping WTO Members to have more informed and factual discussions of the issues at stake.

In this regard, I have observed that one of the encouraging findings of this year's Review of Fisheries is that the balance of risks posed by government support measures has improved significantly since 2010, with a marked reduction in policies that pose the highest risk (e.g., fuel subsidies) in favour of policies where the risk posed is less direct (e.g., income support). In addition, the Review shows that OECD Members have increased their spending on fisheries management, monitoring, control, and surveillance – all measures that are essential to improving and maintaining the health of fish stocks.

Despite these apparent advances in the sector, this year's Review also finds that 65% of all support to fishing activities still presents a risk of encouraging unsustainable fishing in the absence of effective management. This is a particularly salient conclusion for WTO Members as they pursue the second wave of negotiations because the draft disciplines currently on the table tie the use of subsidies that may contribute to overcapacity and overfishing with effective management measures.

Evidence-based findings and analyses of the kind contained in the 2025 Review of Fisheries are why I see the mission of the WTO and mission of the OECD to be complementary, and mutually reinforcing. In different but essential ways, the work of each of our organizations is contributing to fisheries subsidies reform, paving a path for the elimination of harmful subsidies, and ultimately the sustainability of our oceans.

 

Thank you.