Report exposes fishing piracy

SYDNEY - The world's fish stocks are being plundered by pirates using "flags of convenience" to mask their illicit activities, according to a joint report by environmentalists and unionists.

Fishing vessels using those flags - often purchased online for less than $1000 - are responsible for illegal fishing worth $1.7 billion a year, the report concludes. They also endanger the marine environment and treat their crews inhumanely, sometimes keeping them in chains while at sea.

The report - commissioned by the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF), the Australian Government and the International Transport Workers Federation (ITF) - found that 15 per cent of the world's large-scale fishing fleet - or 2800 vessels - flies a flag of convenience or of unknown origin.

The European Union and Taiwan have the largest number of companies operating such vessels, with Spain one of the worst offenders. Forty-six of the boats that fish illegally or unofficially are based in Spain, with 18 in Cyprus and eight in Britain.

Topping the list of countries offering flags of convenience are Panama, St Vincent and the Grenadines, Honduras and Belize, which together account for more than three-quarters of the black market fleet.

Two nations in the top 14 - Mongolia and Bolivia - are landlocked, and Liberia's flag register is run by a private company in the US.

"Flag-hopping" is a growing phenomenon, with owners shopping around to register their vessels in increasingly lax jurisdictions. They are "laundering" their catch by transferring it to legitimate ships at sea.

The pirates generally fish for commercially valuable species, such as bluefin tuna or patagonian toothfish, which command high prices in Japan. They also poach in the waters of developing countries that are unable to patrol their fisheries.

Some species are being driven to extinction by illegal operators, who flout international law aimed at preserving fish stocks, the report says. They also have a cavalier attitude towards "bycatch" - the incidental capture of, for instance, sharks, sea turtles and albatross.

The report documents the abuse of crews, who are often paid poverty wages or work as forced labour and are kept virtual prisoners at sea.

In one recent incident, 11 crew members, mainly Chinese, died in a suspicious fire aboard a Ukrainian-flagged ship, the Simiez, in Montevideo, Uruguay. Port authorities reportedly believed that nine of the men were locked in their cabins at the time.

David Cockcroft, general secretary of the ITF, said that many of the vessels "operate with an unprotected workforce who can be beaten, starved and worked without pay - all out of sight in one of the world's most dangerous industries".

The report says that while the countries issuing flags of convenience are ultimately responsible for the activities of those vessels, in practice they turn a blind eye.

It criticises countries such as Spain and Taiwan, which make it easy for local owners to register ships under other nations' flags.

The flag of convenience system, the report says, "allows an exceptionally large fleet of high-seas fishing vessels to roam the world's oceans in search of high-value species of fish and operate completely outside the rule of international law".

- INDEPENDENT