The number of fishing vessels exploiting African flags to escape effective oversight as they engage in illegal fishing continues to increase, a new report by TM-Tracking has found.
The report, published by Norwegian nonprofit TM-Tracking and a collection of experts under I.R. Consilium, found that the health of Africa’s fisheries, coupled with the limited enforcement capacity of the region’s governments, make Africa an “ideal venue for high-risk fishing operators.” An analysis of fishing operations and illegal fishing cases by TM-Tracking found perpetrators of illegal, unreported, and unregulated (IUU) fishing are tapping into the USD 194 billion (EUR 184 billion) global fishing market without any “meaningful restrictions or management oversight.”
The report identified two high-risk flagging processes being abused in the region: flags of convenience and “flagging-in.” Through flags of convenience, fishers use open registries in certain countries to fish beyond the national jurisdiction, and via flagging-in, foreign-owned and operated vessels exploit local rules to get onto domestic African registries and fish in African waters
“Both these processes afford high-risk foreign fishing operators the opportunity to more easily fish illegally and unsustainably, which in turn undermines the sovereign rights of coastal African States,” the report said.
The majority of African coastal states have flagged vessels that have then gone on to conduct illegal activities, according to IUU listings and domestic information sources.