San Francisco Frontiers - WTO still angling for sustainable fishing deal

Some diplomats accused India of stifling agreement on a whole range of issues being thrashed out at the talks, including fisheries.

Negotiations towards banning subsidies that encourage overfishing and threaten the sustainability of the planet's fish stocks have been going on at the World Trade Organization for more than 20 years.

The global trade body's leader, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, wants to pull off a major coup by finally sealing a deal at the WTO's first ministerial conference in nearly five years, being held in Geneva this week.

"While work is continuing on the last remaining issues, we have never been so close to concluding," said Colombia's WTO ambassador Santiago Wills, who chairs the fisheries negotiations at the organisation.

But with the four-day gathering of trade ministers set to close Wednesday, there were mixed views on whether the negotiations would cross the finish line.

And the conference mood had darkened, with several diplomats pointing the finger at Indian intransigence on not just fisheries but on every topic being thrashed out at the WTO's lakeside headquarters.

The WTO conference is trying to strike deals on e-commerce, agriculture, food security, Covid-19 vaccine patents and WTO reform.

But WTO agreements are only concluded by consensus, meaning objections from any of the 164 members can block progress.

- 'Far-reaching demands' -

EU trade commissioner Valdis Dombrovskis urged ministers to embrace compromise amid the hectic negotiations.

On fisheries, "there are countries taking very strong positions, very far-reaching demands, which in a sense weakens the purpose of this agreement which is to ensure the sustainability of fish stocks and ensure that the way fishing is subsidised does not contribute to unsustainable fishing practices", he told reporters.

Special treatment for the poorest countries is widely accepted, but some self-identified developing countries are demanding exemption from subsidy constraints, including large fishing nations like India.

A Geneva-based diplomat said the fisheries negotiations still hinged on the carve-outs for certain developing countries and whether they would apply to the likes of China and India.

A fisheries deal "would be an extraordinary deliverable for this week if we could actually get there", but "right now, people aren't sure we're going to", the diplomat said.

A $20-million financing fund announced Tuesday, aimed at helping developing countries better manage their fisheries and provide catch data required under the proposed rules, is "sadly" not a game-changer, said the diplomat.

- Birthday dream -

One EU official said that if a formal sustainable fishing agreement could not be reached, the progress so far needed to be preserved in some format.

"I'm not excluding that we might find an agreement, but I think at this stage we have to recognise it's highly unlikely that we would be able to have a fully-fledged agreement in 24-36 hours," the official said.

Okonjo-Iweala took over as WTO director-general in March 2021, staking her leadership on breathing new life into the crippled organisation.

The former Nigerian finance minister warned countries against trying to do trade-offs between the different topics being tackled.

Okonjo-Iweala, who turned 68 on Monday, hoped that a couple of the topics being negotiated would reach a conclusion.

"My own dream for my birthday is to get a successful ministerial," she said.

"One or two packages passed... I think that would do."

But several diplomats have indicated that India is proving the main obstacle in securing any agreements at the conference.

"India is being obstructive across the piece," said one Geneva-based diplomat.

"In no negotiation are they playing a constructive part."

Remi Parmentier, who heads the Varda Group which advises on environmental issues, said on Twitter: "If India is so unhappy at the World Trade Organization, maybe they should just suspend their membership, and let the rest of the members get on."

K.Torres--SFF