“The EU carding system to drive out illegal fishing is showing it has real teeth, and the reason is simple,” says Tony Long, former director, WWF European Policy Office and a Senior Fellow of the Global Government Institute. “Countries are terrified that the ultimate sanction, the red card, imposes potentially enormous financial sanctions and significant risks.”
There’s no simple solution to force the industry, or consumers, to cut back on their insatiable appetite for fish. But with the increasing number of empty nets and a growing Asia population, overfishing continues to deplete oceans across the globe, with nearly 90 per cent of the world’s fisheries fully exploited or facing complete collapse. Certainly, with more armadas of fishing fleets plundering the ocean floors, there’s a looming food security issue unfolding in the South China Sea.
According to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), between 11 and 26 million tons of fish, or 15% of world catches, are caught illegally every year. As the world’s biggest fish importer, the EU does not wish to be complicit in these unsustainable fishing practices. Since 2012 the EU Commission has initiated formal dialogues with several countries, thus the “yellow card” status warning. When significant progress is observed, the Commission can end the dialogue or raise the status to a “green card”. When there’s no or little compliance, it results in a failing grade - a “red card”, which translates into no exports.
Fishing is a cornerstone of Vietnam’s economy and since 2006 the nation has been globally ranked among the top ten leading exporting countries in fisheries. Its seafood industry is recognized as one of the world’s largest, along with the US, China and Norway, and expects to export more than $8 billion of its products worldwide, according to the Vietnam Association of Seafood Exporters (VASEP).
In seafood sales or export turnover - the range is between $1.9 to $2.2 billion - exports to the EU and the U.S. account for 16-17% (each market) with the value set on average per year at $350-$400 million.
Vietnam’s Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development (MARD) and the Directorate of Fisheries, including the Vietnam Association of Seafood Exporters and Producers (VASEP), have mandated that all of them circle their nets to take measurable actions to balance fishing capacity and fishing fleet policy. The new Fisheries Law has been approved by the National Assembly, including regulation articles for the IUU.
This national action plan is a top-down command directive issued by Vietnam’s Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc to crack down on IUU fishing activities. As part of this drive, more than 62 seafood companies have joined ranks to insure sustainability practices.
The government has issued a flurry of decrees and directives, including supplementing IUU fishing regulations to legal documents, enforcement of regulations, educational workshops for fishermen, enhancement of cooperation with coastal and island countries to prevent IUU fishing, and regular dialogues with the EU on efforts to improve fisheries management.
“Of course, the development of marine conservation, aquatic conservation and natural resource protection is needed because stakeholders around the world recognize its importance,” claims Nguyen Hoai Nam, the deputy general secretary of VASEP.
Vietnam recognizes this is not only their problem, since the ten Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) countries are estimated to account for one-fifth of global marine fish production. Six of them are in the world’s top 15 fish producers, with Indonesia in second place. This sector supports over 100 million jobs out of a total population of 600 million, including over 10 million fishers.
With more than 3.5 million fishing vessels in Asia accounting for 75 percent of the global fishing fleet, it’s no wonder that there’s rampant violation of fishing rules and increased competition for marine resources.
Vietnam’s proactive responses including placing observers, many of whom are former fishing captains, aboard their commercial trawlers to complete monitoring of catches. In 2010, in response to a Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development report, Vietnam’s prime minister approved a national system to effectively manage marine protected areas (MPA) in sovereign waters. These include: Hon Mun in Nha Trang Bay, Cu Lao Cham and Phu Quoc. These organizations are an increasingly popular strategy for managing fisheries and contribute to resource rights.
Additionally, fishing captains are encouraged to keep an accurate logbook or registry of catches for inspection or become subject to fines in excess of $2000US and revocation of commercial fishing licenses.
Hanoi simply does not want to repeat Thailand’s mistakes, where a high percentage of the fishing fleet is unregistered and outside government control. Neither does it want to follow its neighbor, Cambodia, and be at the end of the line with a red card from the EU and unable to export fish.
The Vietnamese Directorate of Fisheries has developed a national fishery database that integrates data related to fishing vessels including registration, licensing, logbook entries and now uniformly-accepted software (VNFISHBASE) utilized in 8 coastal provinces.
While the nation’s fishery associations believe that there’s a need for more vocational centers to educate fishers about current and relevant fishing regulations, it’s an unclear future about Vietnam’s fisheries management regime. In the meantime, more time may be needed to earn a higher EU report card.
Having identified its weakness in 2023, entering the first quarter of 2024, Vietnam's shrimp industry has undergone a clear change, reflected through increases in exports to major markets.
It is necessary to develop more detailed and consistent regulations on seafood production for export in line with the implementation of solutions towards sustainable and responsible fishing practices.
(seafood.vasep.com.vn) After increasing to the highest level in 2022, Canada's tuna imports in 2023 dropped to the lowest level in the past 10 years, reaching 35 thousand tons, down 24% over the year. Canada is currently one of the 15 largest tuna import markets in the world.
(seafood.vasep.com.vn) Chile, one of the countries participating in the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP), has tended to increase tuna imports from Vietnam in the past 3 years. According to statistics from Vietnam Customs, this South American country imported nearly 3 million USD of tuna products from Vietnam in the first 2 months of 2024, an increase of 58% over the same period in 2023.
Economic and social development activities, overexploitation, pollution, diseases, and climate change have adversely affected the ecological environment, leading to a severe decline or the extinction of many precious indigenous aquatic species.
(seafood.vasep.com.vn) The prices of pangasius fingerlings and raw pangasius in ponds fell in March, following steady increases in the first two months of this year.
(seafood.vasep.com.vn) In February 2024, the average export price of Vietnamese pangasius to markets increased by 4%, although the volume decreased by 40% compared to the previous month.
(seafood.vasep.com.vn) There was a 6% decline in Vietnam's pangasius exports to Brazil in February 2024 compared to the same period in 2023, with the total value reaching 6 million USD.
(vasep.com.vn) In the first two months of 2024, Poland—which ranks as Vietnam's fourth-largest EU supplier of tuna—became a noteworthy market. Vietnam's tuna exports value to Poland increased by 786% in comparison to the same period last year, totaling over $2 million USD and contributing about 2% of the country's overall tuna exports revenue.
Regulations on the protection and sustainable development of aquatic resources, Việt Nam's legitimate rights at sea in accordance with international law and the achievements that the country has carved out to remove the European Union’s “yellow card” will be brought closer to local people.
VASEP - HIỆP HỘI CHẾ BIẾN VÀ XUẤT KHẨU THỦY SẢN VIỆT NAM
Chịu trách nhiệm: Ông Nguyễn Hoài Nam - Phó Tổng thư ký Hiệp hội
Đơn vị vận hành trang tin điện tử: Trung tâm VASEP.PRO
Trưởng Ban Biên tập: Bà Phùng Thị Kim Thu
Giấy phép hoạt động Trang thông tin điện tử tổng hợp số 138/GP-TTĐT, ngày 01/10/2013 của Bộ Thông tin và Truyền thông
Tel: (+84 24) 3.7715055 – (ext.203); email: kimthu@vasep.com.vn
Trụ sở: Số 7 đường Nguyễn Quý Cảnh, Phường An Phú, Quận 2, Tp.Hồ Chí Minh
Tel: (+84) 28.628.10430 - Fax: (+84) 28.628.10437 - Email: vasephcm@vasep.com.vn
VPĐD: số 10, Nguyễn Công Hoan, Ngọc Khánh, Ba Đình, Hà Nội
Tel: (+84 24) 3.7715055 - Fax: (+84 24) 37715084 - Email: vasephn@vasep.com.vn