The increasing activity of pirates in the Gulf of Aden, off the coast of the failed state of Somalia, has been consistently present in the international news for the past several years, and has turned the waters off Somalia into the most dangerous shipping lanes in the world. In 2008 over 70 hijackings were reported (NY Times: “Somalias Pirates Flourish in a Lawless Nation,” 30 October 2008). While the safety of commercial shipping lanes is a key focus of Western Nations in this area, governments have made it clear that the safety of the area for fishing vessels is also a key priority. A Washington Post article (“Pirates Release Ships to US Navy,” 5 November 2007) quoted US Naval Forces Central Command News Release No. 226-07 as declaring the “goal of patrols was so that fishing could occur safely in the region.” And a January BBC article (“Somali Piracy ‘Reduced Tuna Haul,'” 22 January 2009) reported that the Indian Ocean tuna fishery, worth up to $6B, experienced a decline in catches of 30%, with Spain and France reporting decreases of 50%.
While hijacked ships, many of them fishing boats, is a worrisome problem for security, blame for the start of the piracy most likely needs to come at least partially back to the same countries that are now common victims. Charles Clover, in his book The End of the Line: How Overfishing is Changing the World and What We Eat, points out that the most suspicious part of the situation is the presence of international fishing vessels in Somalian waters to begin with. This is a country with essentially no functioning government; how can it be expected to fairly regulate it’s maritime territory and resources? Clover claims that when EU nations buy millions of dollars worth of fishing rights in foreign waters each year they prefer to target troubled and unstable nations who, lacking advanced fishing and security fleets, are not in a position to charge what their fisheries are actually worth.
Clover discusses the aggressive nature of countries with advanced fishing fleets, particularly the EU nations, in areas all over the world. Drastically depleted European fishing stocks are the reason EU members pay other countries for the right to harvest in foreign waters. And when a purchasing country’s own harvesting quota has been filled, it can continue to fish abroad by purchasing Flags of Convenience from other country’s who again lack their own adequate fishing fleet. They then fish to fill that country’s quota. For example, the vessel freed in the US Navy raid discussed in the Washington Post article above (“Pirates Release Ships to US Navy,” 5 November 2007) was South Korean-owned but fishing in Somalian waters under the Tanzanian flag (and the crew was likely composed of several other nationalities altogether). If it sounds incredibly complicated and shady it’s because it is. Unfortunately data on world fisheries and world fishery catch rates is generally poor and in short supply, but a comparable example to Somalia is Senegal. Clover cites Daviel Pauley from the University of British Columbia who estimates that Senegal’s fish stocks are down 50% since EU vessels (many of them Spanish) began buying annual territorial rights in the late 1940’s. Fisheries scientists and monitors have also estimated that while the purchased EU quota was for 13,200 tons a year, the actual landed catch (a figure that excludes the discarded bycatch, often composing >50% of the total catch) by EU vessels in Sengalese waters has been between 88,000 and 110,000 tons of fish a year. The crash has significantly affected the 600,000 Sengalese who make a living by fishing, many of them using hand-made nets and small wooden pirogues.
How likely is it, then, that vessels from the EU and other developed nations fishing “legally” under their own country’s flags, “legally” under other country’s flags, and flat-out illegally, drove down fishing stocks to the point that fishing lost economic viability as an occupation in Somalia? I found two articles from major newspapers, both NY Times articles from September and October 2008 that directly addressed this possibility. One article (“Somalia Pirates Tell Their Side: They Want Only Money,” 30 September 2008) quoted a Somalian “government” official who claimed organized groups initially formed to extract taxes from illegally fishing foreign vessels about 10-15 years ago, and then got greedy, turning to full-time piracy. The same article quoted the pirate spokesman for the crew on the ship carrying Ukranian arms (captured in September and recently released) who claimed the pirates wanted “to stop illegal fishing and dumping in our waters.” The other article, “Somalia’s Pirates Flourish in a Lawless Nation” (30 October 2008) also quoted Somalians suggesting illegal dumping and overfishing drove men to piracy.
There is no doubt that piracy, having worked its way into the Somlian economy, would be more complicated to eradicate than simply restoring the Gulf of Aden’s fish stocks. But I find the situation an interesting one, particularly as the crash of nearly all oceanic fish species transitions from an environmental crisis to a social and political one. The percentage of the world’s human population living in close proximity to the ocean is staggering; think of how important fish function as a source of the world’s protein, and as a source of global employment. The situation in the waters off Somalia demonstrate that protecting the ocean’s fish stocks is not only an environmental, moral, and social justice issue, but an issue of international security as well.