Sustainable Fishing

Sustainable Fishing
Organized by the Asian Farmers’ Association for Sustainable Rural Development (AFA) and Pacific Island Farmers Organisation Network (PIFON)
9 June 2021 | 16:00 – 18:00 GMT/UTC+8 (Manila Time)

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Understanding the Food Systems Summit   

The UN Secretary-General, António Guterres, has called on all world leaders to take part in the Food Systems Summit in 2021 to help establish the future direction for food systems in the world and accelerate collective action to that end. This reflects the recognition that transforming food systems is central in efforts to achieve all the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by 2030. The Summit will be held in New York in September 2021 and will be preceded by a Pre-Summit in Rome in July 2021.

The Food Systems Summit will launch new actions to deliver progress on all 17 SDGs, each of which relies to some degree on healthier, more sustainable, and equitable food systems.

The Summit expects the following outcomes:

• Dramatically elevated public discourse about the importance of food systems leading to the achievement of the SDGs.
• Significant action, with measurable outcomes. (This will include highlighting existing solutions and celebrating leaders in food systems transformation, as well as calling for new actions worldwide)
• A high-level set of principles established through the process that will guide Member States and other stakeholders to leverage their food systems capacity to support the SDGs.
• A system of follow-up and review that will drive new actions and results; allow for sharing of experiences, lessons and knowledge; and incorporate new metrics for impact analysis.

However, debates are surfacing as to what direction the food systems summit will take to ensure that issues on hunger, malnutrition, social justice, and the planet will be at the fore of these solutions. A revisit and evaluation of our present food system is also imperative if we are to chart a transformative, just, resilient, and sustainable food system that puts the interests and needs of food producers and consumers across the globe. As such, they said summit matters to everyone, from the food producers to the consumers, and has never been timelier given the challenges of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Food Systems Summit Dialogues

In preparation for the Summit, the UN Special Envoy for the Food Systems Summit Dr. Agnes Kalibata has invited all sectors of society to share their perspectives and solutions. These Dialogues obtain input from a global audience (from youth activists to indigenous leaders, from smallholder farmers to scientists and CEOs) both before and after the Summit with the aim to transform the way the world produces, consumes and disposes of food.

Independent Summit Dialogues, such as this event facilitated by Farmers Forum, will only connect into the Summit process through an official feedback mechanism. Independent Summit Dialogues will offer opportunities and spaces for citizens to critically engage and propose pathways towards sustainable food systems, exploring new ways of working together and encouraging collaborative action.

The outcomes of the Dialogues will feed into the Summit’s five priority Action Tracks and the preparatory work of its Scientific Group to support changes in global food systems to deliver the SDGs by 2030.

Independent Dialogue on Sustainable Fishing

Small scale fishers play a key role in ensuring food and nutrition security, and eradicating poverty. Aquatic food  systems strategies can help address the complex issue of the “triple burden of malnutrition” (food insecurity, undernutrition and overweight). Many coastal and inland populations rely on fish as the most accessible source of animal protein. In addition to high-quality protein, fish, especially small fish consumed whole, can be rich sources of omega-3 fatty acids, vitamins A, D and B, and minerals such as calcium, zinc, iodine and iron, while seaweed represents an excellent source of fatty acids, vitamins and minerals.

Global fish production is estimated to have reached 179M tons in 2018, with 156M tons used for human consumption. Aquaculture accounted for 52% of fish for human consumption. China is a major fish producer at 34%, and the rest from Asia produces 34% and Oceania 1%, thus , bringing total fish production in Asia Pacific to 69% of global fish production. In fact, fish farming is dominated by Asia, which has produced 89% of the global total of volume in the last 20 years. An estimated 59.51 million people were engaged (on a full-time, part-time or occasional basis) in the primary sector of capture fisheries (39.0 million people) and aquaculture (20.5 million people) in 2018. Women accounted for 14 percent of the total, with shares of 19 percent in aquaculture and 12 percent in capture fisheries. Of all those engaged in primary production, most are in developing countries, and most are small-scale, artisanal fishers and aquaculture workers. The highest numbers of workers are in Asia (85 percent), followed by Africa (9 percent), the Americas (4 percent), and Europe and Oceania (1 percent each). When post-harvest operations data are included, it is estimated that one in two workers in the sector is a woman.

Of all those engaged in fishing and fish farming, most are in developing countries, and the majority are small-scale, artisanal fishers and aquaculture workers. The various types of work in the primary sector cannot be considered equal as the forms of employment or engagement vary from occasional to full-time and between seasonal, temporary, and permanent occupations. Workers in fisheries and aquaculture are often engaged in more precarious types of employment, and at the far end of the spectrum, there is forced labour and slavery.

Small fishers are facing a plethora of challenges in Asia and elsewhere. Owing to their poor economic status and often marginalized social status, their voices are not heard by the policymakers adequately. Small fishers are facing the worst crises today. Apart from poverty and discrimination, the added perils are climate change-induced extreme weather conditions and depletion of species. Access and control over natural resources have always been a contentious issue for poor fishers, who face hurdles to access sea beaches, park their boats, and dry their nets due to indiscriminate grabbing of coastal land for tourism and other industrial purposes. Also dumping effluent near the coast and in deep sea adversely affect their catches.  Though there are rules restricting trawlers from fishing near the shore, violation of that rule is rampant and regulation is very weak.

On the social entitlement front too, fishers are disadvantaged. Existing social schemes, various pensions, and insurance schemes fall short of the need. This is simply because these schemes are not developed keeping fishers issues/challenges in mind. For example, in India, the eligibility age of Below Poverty Level Old-age pension is a minimum of 60 years but it is almost impossible for poor fishers to go deep sea fishing till 60 years and feed his/her family because it is too hazardous and strenuous for them.

There are not many alternative/allied livelihood options for those fishers, who retire from deep sea fishing. A frugal old-age pension is inadequate for a decent living too. For fisherwomen on top of all the above challenges, there are a few more to add. The very first one starts with a lack of recognition. In a country like India fisherwomen normally must try 10 times more to get a fisher card (which is often linked with ownership of boat and net and in many cases, women don’t ‘own’ these assets). Secondly, majority of fisherwomen are in fish vending with no hygienic and secured workplace at markets. They suffer from lack of transportation facilities (often local regular transport refuse to take them due to smell of fish and dipping water etc), inadequate knowledge of market price fluctuation, poor capacity for value addition (includes poor or no capital for investment), double workload (at the market and at home), exposure to harassment and insecurity. Losing their near and dear ones in the sea is not new to a fisher family and often the mortal remaining of the fishers are not recovered. In such cases, fisherwomen have to wait 10 or more years to claim widow pension (Indian case).

Many fishers are Internally Displaced People, due to an increase in extreme climate events like floods and cyclones as well as a rise in sea level. Thus they migrate from one place to another and many lack necessary papers from local authorities to claim entitlements.

Encroachment of big companies in the coast for industry, tourism, and dumping of effluent, etc further impoverished poor fishers and they are losing their grounds fast. The increased price of fuel and other essential items have added to their misery. Last but not least lack of coordination among different government departments (lack of apt policies) has slowed down the pace of serving poor fishers through existing schemes. Though IG SSF is adopted in COFI and agreed upon by UN nation-states, national-level awareness & implementation are very poor so far. Also, the instrument is not binding, neither it has civil society monitoring mechanisms in place.

In the light of the contributions of the fisheries sector in food and nutrition security, and in the light of the issues and challenges faced by small scale women and men fishers who form the majority of the labor force in fisheries, this Independent Dialogue would like to gather together representatives of small scale fishers’ organizations in a discussion on the solutions they have undertaken to overcome these challenges while contributing to the sustainability of the oceans, of the lands, and the ecosystem in general. In this Independent Dialogue, we would like to hear their voices, their perspectives, their solutions, and their recommendation so that as small scale women and men fishers, they can play their utmost part in contributing to the global goals of ending hunger and poverty, first amongst their communities, and next, to the whole society.

Objectives

1. Increase the understanding of the participants about the issues and challenges faced by small scale men and women fishers in the Asia Pacific region as well as their initiatives towards sustainable fisheries.
2. Highlight the solutions and key messages from small scale fishers in effectively implementing the VGSSF and in building the capacities of small fishers

Participants

Target participants are small scale women and men fishers, NGOs, academe, local and national government agencies officials, international partners, and other support groups.

Program

Moderator: PIFON