The United States should consider leading a multilateral coalition with South American nations to react against China’s illegal fishing and trade practices, an American intelligence agency recommended in a document obtained by Axios.
Why it matters: China’s illegal fishing industry is the largest in the world. Beijing has made fishing in distant waters a geopolitical priority, seeing Chinese private fishing fleets as a way to extend state power far beyond its shores.
- A senior US government official confirmed to Axios that several government agencies are “examining this in light of the president’s priorities”, which include “deepening cooperation with allies and partners in the challenges we face for our economy and national security.”
What is happening: Huge fleets of hundreds of Chinese vessels had boats fishing illegally in the territorial waters of the countries of South America, including off the Galapagos Islands.
- The activity depleted stocks and interrupted food chains, in a practice referred to as illegal, unreported or unregulated (IUU) fishing.
- South American nations say these fleets are a challenge to their economic and environmental security, but their navies generally lack the resources to effectively monitor and patrol their own waters.
- Last year, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador and Peru said they would join forces to defend their territorial waters from incursions by Chinese ships.
Details: “South American countries would likely receive a coalition effort to increase trade pressure on China and enforce fishing standards,” officials from the Office of Intelligence and Analysis wrote in a February 5 document labeled sensitive, but not classified.
- “Unilateral pressure from the United States would likely result in China applying similar sanctions, just as Beijing did in enacting a new law to contain US restrictions on technology companies,” said the office, an intelligence agency in the Department of Homeland Security. .
- Several offices and agencies are working together in this effort, including the U.S. Coast Guard, the Office of Naval Intelligence, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the State Department, according to the document and government sources.
The document was assessed with “high confidence” that Chinese fishing in South American waters would also “cause continued economic damage to US domestic fishing as a result of anti-competitive tactics.”
- He assessed with “average confidence” that China is likely to “continue fishing practices in South American waters, despite recent actions by governments and an intergovernmental organization to limit these activities”.
- He also assessed with “average confidence” that South American countries would receive a coalition to increase the application of fishing standards.
What they are saying: “There is a lack of understanding of this problem, which is a global problem, that fishing is very stressed,” the senior government official told Axios.
- The Trump administration “has started some work on the issue of counter-IUU globally in the role of China, since it has emerged as the biggest perpetrator of this,” said the official, who added that the Biden administration continues to see this as a priority.
Background: Former Chinese President Hu Jintao called for China to become a major maritime power, and in 2013, the Chinese Council of State raised the fishing industry to the level of a strategic industry.
- The Chinese government provides subsidies to the fishing industry, which allows boats to cover the fuel costs of shipping to distant coasts, including near West Africa and South America.
- “China’s leaders see distant water fleets as a way of projecting presence around the world, so that when the time comes to establish regulatory structures, they have a major influence on the configuration of these structures,” said Tabitha Mallory, CEO of consulting firm China Ocean Institute and affiliated professor at the University of Washington.
- The goal is to “be present in all the world’s oceans so that they can direct the results of international agreements covering maritime resources,” said Mallory, “including not only fishing, but mining the deep sea, the Arctic” and other important issues and regions.
The US government paid more attention China’s increasingly global deep-sea fishing fleets in recent years.
- The Maritime Security and Fisheries Supervision Act (SAFE), passed in December 2019, established a “government-wide approach” to tackling IUU fishing.
- In May 2020, President Trump issued an executive order to combat illegal deep-sea fishing and help promote U.S. competitiveness in the sector.
- In September 2020, the State Department added fish caught by fishing fleets in distant waters from China to its list of products produced by forced labor – a potential concern also raised in the DHS document.
The final result: “Other countries need to weigh in on these issues as well,” said Mallory.