Introduction
Global seafood demand is surging, especially in Europe and Asia. Simultaneously, local fish stocks are dwindling. This combination has fueled the growth of distant-water fleets (DWF) from Europe and Northeast Asia, increasingly targeting the waters of developing nations, particularly in the ‘global South’ [1]. Over 70% of the seafood consumed within the European Union (EU) now originates from outside its own waters, predominantly from the developing world [2–5]. Japan’s situation mirrors this [3], and it is likely a growing trend for China as well [6].
Many developing countries lack the financial muscle and technical expertise to effectively monitor and regulate foreign industrial fishing activities. This unfortunately leads to overfishing, under-reported catches, and unsustainable exploitation of marine resources [7–10]. Catch data reported by DWFs are often unreliable, especially when host countries have limited monitoring and surveillance capabilities [11,12]. This discrepancy creates significant gaps between official statistics submitted to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and the actual reality in the water.
Few developing nations have the capacity to fully exploit their offshore fish stocks independently. The investment in technical infrastructure, financial resources, and robust governance needed for industrial fishing fleets is often prohibitive. Ghana and Thailand are notable exceptions [13, 14]. Consequently, most developing countries resort to selling their ‘surplus’ catch – the difference between the maximum sustainable yield they cannot access domestically and their actual landings [15]. The 1980s United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) mandates that countries should grant access to this surplus to foreign nations through various agreements [16]. Ideally, host countries would prioritize their local economies and regional needs before granting fishing access. However, economically vulnerable countries often prioritize short-term gains, seeking foreign currency and debt servicing through fisheries access agreements [17]. Fees are often negotiated based on the potential income of foreign fishing capacity, rather than on sustainable catch quotas [8]. This short-sighted approach neglects the importance of domestic processing and marketing, hindering long-term local development.
The misconception that “data is lacking” to determine sustainable catch levels is also a significant issue. While developing countries may lack robust science-based fisheries policies, this is not necessarily due to a complete absence of data. Rather, it often stems from a lack of support for scientists to analyze existing catch data, fishing effort, and related economic information. This study aims to demonstrate that sufficient data exists regarding European and Chinese distant-water fisheries in West Africa to make meaningful inferences about their catches, economic value, and to make initial comparisons of the fees paid by the EU and China for fishing rights in the region. These are crucial elements for informed fisheries policy. This research seeks to estimate and compare the fees paid by both the EU and China for access to West African fisheries, while also examining their catch reporting practices, the landed value of their catches, and levels of illegal fishing activity. Ultimately, we aim to shed light on the economic dynamics at play in West African fisheries, contrasting the “euros” of European investment with the “yuan” of China’s growing influence.
Fishing Opportunities in West Africa: A Comparative Look
1. West Africa: A Key Fishing Zone
For this study, West Africa is defined as the region stretching from the Strait of Gibraltar (36° 8′ N and 5° 21′ W) to the southern tip of Namibia (17°15’S, 11°48’E), excluding South Africa. This area falls within FAO statistical areas 34 (Eastern Central Atlantic) and 47 (South Eastern Atlantic) and includes the coastal nations of Morocco (including Western Sahara), Mauritania, Cape Verde, Senegal, The Gambia, Guinea Bissau, Guinea, Sierra Leone, Liberia, Côte d’Ivoire, Ghana, Togo, Benin, Nigeria, Cameroon, Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, Sao Tome and Principe, Congo (Brazzaville), Congo (ex-Zaire), Angola, and Namibia (See Fig. 1). Data on foreign catches in Namibian waters are limited to the EU component before the early 2000s.
2. The Allure of West African Waters: Foreign Access and Agreements
West Africa’s rich marine biodiversity is fueled by highly productive currents like the Canary Current [18], the Guinea Current [19], and the Benguela Current upwelling system [20,21]. This, coupled with the limited capacity of local fleets to exploit offshore resources, fish stock depletion elsewhere, and rising global seafood demand, makes West Africa a prime target for foreign fishing [11,22–24]. Foreign nations have long been drawn to West Africa through both formal fishing agreements and illegal fishing operations [25,26].
Fishing agreements, in this context, are defined as the legal right to access marine resources within a host country’s Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) in exchange for financial compensation. These agreements can take various forms:
- Bilateral or Multilateral Agreements: Between a host government and an intergovernmental organization like the EU, such as Fishing Partnership Agreements (FPAs).
- Government-to-Government Agreements: Between a host government and the government of a DWF flag country.
- Private Joint Venture Agreements: Between a company and a host government (often termed ‘second-generation agreements’). These agreements are often less transparent [27]. Second-generation agreements typically involve chartering or temporarily transferring fishing vessels, often leading to the reflagging of industrial fleets to the host country. For instance, much of Mauritania’s industrial fleet consists of Chinese-Mauritanian joint ventures, and Senegal’s industrial fleet is largely composed of EU-reflagged vessels [28,29]. EU fleets, similar to China, are involved in numerous joint ventures across West Africa, including in Guinea Bissau, Guinea, Sierra Leone, Gabon, Angola, and Namibia. Official data from 1997 indicated China landed 57,500 tonnes using approximately 53 vessels under West African flags [30]. The lack of recent official Chinese data and the difficulty in tracking EU joint ventures highlight a critical issue: a lack of transparency in foreign fishing activities.
Alder and Sumaila [26] noted a significant increase in fishing agreements in West Africa following the global surge in fish demand. The number of agreements rose from 36 in the 1960s to 242 by the 1980s (after the establishment of EEZs under UNCLOS) and reached 302 in the early 2000s. These figures exclude ‘domestic’ offshore fleets, which often consist of reflagged European and Chinese vessels [28,31,32]. More recent estimates show over a thousand industrial fishing vessels operating in the West African sub-region alone (Mauritania to Sierra Leone), including 700 foreign vessels from the EU, China, and South Korea [33]. Consequently, approximately 25% of the fish caught by European countries originates from West African waters [26].
West African countries often possess limited political and economic leverage. As a result, the benefits derived from their fisheries resources are frequently not shared equitably with DWF countries [7,8,34]. Many West African nations also lack the resources to effectively monitor and enforce the conditions of these access agreements, despite improvements in some countries like Morocco, Mauritania, Sierra Leone, and Namibia. EU agreements in West Africa (available at http://eur-lex.europa.eu) typically include conditions such as offloading catches in host country ports, reporting catches, paying for additional fishing capacity, and providing negotiated financial compensation for access. However, compensation often primarily covers access to EEZ resources, with limited consideration for the actual state of fish stocks, human rights, or governance within the host country. This is particularly true for countries heavily reliant on access payments for foreign exchange [15], potentially overlooking human rights concerns [35,36], the status of already overexploited resources, and potentially engaging in agreements under questionable circumstances involving corruption or coercion [12].
The combination of abundant resources and weak monitoring/enforcement due to governance challenges creates an environment ripe for largely unregulated and often illegal foreign fishing off the coast of West Africa. While fishing access agreements allow West African nations to capture some of the economic value of their fisheries, which were freely accessible to DWFs before EEZ declarations, the adequacy of financial compensation, economic returns for development, and even the legality of EU agreements have been frequently questioned. Despite this, few studies have quantified the income generated under these or other agreements [7,8,35,37,38]. France, Spain, Portugal, Greece, and Italy are the primary EU countries operating under public EU-Africa agreements. Other nations from Western, Northern, and Eastern Europe, Asia, Flag of Convenience (FoC) countries, and others also engage in significant fishing activities in West Africa (see Table 1 for references).
The increasing engagement of China in Africa has attracted considerable attention in Europe [39–41]. In the fisheries sector, the growing fishing effort from both Europe and China on the same resources suggests increasing competition for access to West African fishing grounds [42]. In a typical economic market, competition for a limited and highly demanded resource should drive up prices. However, in West Africa, despite increasing competition between the EU and China (and other nations like Korea and Eastern European countries), the compensation paid by Europe to countries like Morocco and Mauritania varies significantly (see agreements at http://eur-lex.europa.eu). This disparity suggests a potential undervaluation of highly sought-after fish resources. Furthermore, the growing scarcity of fish stocks, exacerbated by illegal foreign fishing and the expansion of domestic small-scale fishing, creates a negative feedback loop. Declining stocks push artisanal fleets to venture further offshore [43] and industrial vessels to encroach on near-shore waters, often legally reserved for domestic small-scale fishers [44].
3. Local Communities: The Importance and Impact of Fisheries
Fisheries in West Africa, excluding access fees, contribute over 20% to the primary sector of the economy in many countries [45]. The sector provides jobs that enable people to purchase essential staples like rice and wheat. Increasingly frequent and intense climate events, such as cyclical droughts, are driving populations to coastal areas in search of alternative livelihoods to agriculture and pastoralism, further increasing pressure on domestic fisheries [46–48]. However, fisheries themselves are vulnerable to climate change, particularly in Sub-Saharan Africa [49], where food security is heavily reliant on fish [50]. The potential collapse of fisheries, coupled with declining income from fishing, could trap coastal populations between failing agriculture due to increased droughts and failing fisheries.
Overexploitation of fish stocks, the shift towards high-value species for export, and export subsidies threaten food security in host countries [51,52]. Increased exports to Europe can limit the availability of fish for local consumption, often leaving only small pelagic species, whose abundance is highly dependent on climate [50]. This further strains already overfished stocks, reducing fish supply at both regional and domestic levels [53].
4. The Value of West African Fisheries to EU and Chinese Distant Water Fleets
Landed values of catches are crucial for analyzing fisheries policy and foreign trade. These values drive the behavior of heavily subsidized DWFs. Subsidies, payments from public entities to industries, include fees paid for access to foreign fisheries, categorized as capacity-enhancing subsidies [4]. These subsidies provide a significant incentive for DWFs to continue operating. The EU provides subsidies through bilateral access agreement fees, partly funded by the fishing industry. China typically provides payments in the form of government development aid. China’s annual global DWF subsidies are estimated at over $4.1 billion USD, slightly less than the EU’s $4.6 billion USD annually [4]. Compensation for West African fisheries is expected to be relatively low, while the landed value in international markets is more significant due to increasing foreign fishing capacity. West African governments are often unable to improve domestic food security or implement poverty reduction strategies amidst increasing competition from DWFs and the issue of unknown or under-reported catches. Compensation received by West African countries under access agreements is often unclear, and the conditions of these agreements are frequently confidential, except for EU FPAs. However, even FPAs have been shown to be unbalanced in terms of compensation value [38] and issues of overcapacity and reporting [54,55]. The ‘value’ of catches taken by foreign fleets is typically considered only at its ex-vessel value, excluding value-added contributions. Furthermore, host countries’ limited capacity to monitor DWF activities and enforce agreement terms hinders their ability to benefit from these agreements, which should ideally promote local development. Therefore, local governments often insist on at least partial local landing and processing of DWF catches. If foreign fleets underreport catches, financial compensation for access agreements or joint ventures will not accurately reflect the true landed value of catches from West African resources. In this study, the value of foreign catches includes both reported and unreported catches. The issue of unreported and potentially illegal catches is therefore crucial when evaluating compensation and raises questions of international accountability for underreporting and illegal fishing.
5. Study Objective: Comparing Euros and Yuan in West African Fisheries
This study focuses on evaluating and comparing EU-West Africa and China-West Africa fishing agreements, specifically examining the compensation West African countries receive from the EU and China. As a first step, we investigate the reliability of catch data reported by EU and Chinese fleets by comparing official data with literature-based reconstructed catch data [56]. We then estimate the total landed value of catches by EU and Chinese fleets operating off West African countries. Given the negative European perception of China’s growing involvement in West Africa [39], a country-by-country analysis will compare the performance of EU FPAs relative to Chinese agreements in terms of:
- a) Illegal, Unreported, and Unregulated (IUU) fishing
- b) Amount of compensation provided
- c) Patterns of resource exploitation
By comparing the economic scales – “euros” versus “yuan” – of these agreements, this study aims to provide a clearer picture of the dynamics shaping fisheries in West Africa and their implications for sustainable resource management and equitable partnerships.
Materials and Methods
1. Estimating Catches of the EU and China
Industrial foreign catch data for West African EEZs (excluding Cameroon between 1950-2010 and Namibia in the 2000s, as their industrial catches are considered domestic – see Table 1) were extracted using a bottom-up catch reconstruction approach [56]. These data, referred to as ‘reconstructed catches’, cover the period 1950–2010. A fundamental principle of this method is that zero is not a plausible estimate for a known but unrecorded fisheries component [57]. Even illegal trawl fisheries, with unknown catches, cannot have a catch of zero. The method assumes that illegal foreign fleets, even when subsidized, must recoup a significant portion of their operational costs, thus establishing a baseline for estimating minimum catch [6]. Reconstructed catches, therefore, include legal (but unreported) and illegal (and unreported) components from various fleets worldwide. For this study, legal catches are defined as those obtained under legal fishing agreements, regardless of adherence to host countries’ specific fishing regulations. This includes catches by licensed foreign vessels in prohibited artisanal fishing zones or using illegal gear, considered domestic regulation violations rather than international crimes [58,59].
Official (reported) DWF catch data, as reported to and by the FAO, cover broad FAO areas 34 and 47, not specific EEZs. To compare reconstructed catches with official data, we used the catch data allocation method developed by the Sea Around Us project [60]. This method allocates catches to each EEZ within the FAO areas from 1950 to 2006, updated to 2010 assuming consistent spatial allocation for reported catches (proportionality). This approach allows for the distribution of landing statistics from large FAO areas to specific EEZs. However, proportionality assumes unreported catches correlate with reported catches, meaning higher reported catches in an EEZ imply higher unreported catches. This method’s limitation is its inability to account for variations in fleet behavior, assuming uniform behavior across all fleets. Namibia was excluded as Namibian catches post-independence were considered domestic. We compared these reported catches to reconstructed catches to analyze the performance of Chinese and EU-West Africa agreements.
2. Calculating Landed Value of West African Fisheries
Landed value is defined here as the product of average ex-vessel price and landings (including reported, unreported, and illegal landings), calculated using West African ex-vessel fish prices. West African landed value is an underestimate as it excludes the potential value of discards, which often include marketable species in West African markets. By-catch landed by DWFs, often flagged to West African countries, is included in this analysis.
To determine the landed value of EU and Chinese catches, we used reconstructed catch data per country (Table 1) and average ex-vessel prices (in 2005 USD per tonne) from Swartz et al. [61] for 2000-2010. Significant variations in ex-vessel prices exist, even between neighboring countries (e.g., Moroccan hake valued at $4000 US·t-1 vs. Mauritanian hake at $118 US·t-1 [61]). We used the World Bank’s Consumer Price Index (CPI) per country to convert real prices to 2013 USD per tonne [2013 Price = [2000 to 2010] Price x (2013 CPI/2005 CPI)]. Using regional market ex-vessel prices allows for landed value comparisons across foreign countries, regardless of international market price variations. Landed value was calculated by multiplying average ex-vessel prices (2013 USD) by the corresponding reconstructed catch in each EEZ. This analysis was performed for both EU and Chinese catches (Table 1).
3. Comparing Agreement Value and Landed Value: EU vs. China
To compare the landed value of catches with compensation paid by the EU and China, we derived the average annual amount received by each West African country (Table 1) for 2010 or the most recent fishing agreement before 2010.
Data on European FPAs were sourced from the European Union law database (http://eur-lex.europa.eu). Amounts paid by the EU for West African fisheries access under FPAs (in Euros, including license and other fees) were collected, converted to USD using the 2010 annual Euro-to-USD exchange rate, and then adjusted to 2013 USD using the CPI. We did not consider whether these payments were directly or indirectly linked to other trade arrangements, unless explicitly stated in the agreement.
Unlike EU FPAs, which involve governments, Chinese-West African agreements often include joint ventures and reflagged vessels, even in government-level agreements. The Chinese agreements considered here are intergovernmental, excluding second-generation agreements between companies.
While some China-West Africa agreements are documented, the financial details are often confidential or expressed as ‘project values’ in exchange for fishing access (e.g., construction projects in Gabon, military equipment in Mauritania). We considered the value of these projects as the agreement value if there was direct evidence linking the project to fishing access, rather than part of a broader package encompassing multiple sectors. Project values were assessed using media reports and economic news (see S1 Table and S1 Materials for details). A transparent example is the $150 million USD [62] paid by China to Morocco (1988-2002) for fishing access and joint ventures (Table 2), involving 26 companies (http://ma.china-embassy.org/fra/xwdt/t464813.htm). Chinese fees to Mauritania, except for a recent agreement (Table 2) with a $100 million USD compensation over 25 years [63, 64], were largely opaque. This lack of transparency in Chinese fisheries agreements may introduce bias, which we hope future agreements and studies will address. We present these preliminary results to encourage greater transparency.
We compared the financial compensation paid by the EU and China for fishing access to the landed value of reported catches (‘official compensation rate’) and to the total landed value based on reconstructed catches (‘actual compensation rate’). The difference between these rates represents the minimum economic loss for West African countries. This analysis required two conditions: both EU and China having agreements with the country, and documented access fees. In the absence of agreements, catches (excluding joint ventures or reflagged vessels considered domestic) and their value are considered illegal. This allowed us to quantify the proportion of landed value covered by fishing agreements for both Europe and China.
Results
1. Catch Volumes: Europe and China in West Africa
Our bottom-up estimation of Chinese catches from West Africa averaged 2.3 million t·year-1 between 2000 and 2010. This is about 20% lower than the midpoint estimate by Pauly et al. [6] (2.9 million t·year-1) but within their 95% confidence interval (1.84-4.30 million t·year-1). Excluding Namibia (12% of total EEZ area) from our analysis for the 2000s further reduces this gap. The consistency between these estimates, derived from different methods, is noteworthy.
Chinese fleet catches in West Africa grew rapidly after the mid-1980s. Our estimates include 1.4 million t·year-1 of legal but unreported catches, 761,000 t·year-1 of illegal (or unregulated before EEZ declarations) and unreported catches, 20,200 t·year-1 reported to the FAO (FAO area 34 and 47 data for China), and 159,000 t·year-1 reported as domestic catches by West African fleets but beneficially owned by China. Only 8% of total catches were officially reported by China, consistent with Pauly et al. (2013). Under-reporting by China’s legal fleet peaked in the 1980s, when China began distant-water fishing in West Africa. While under-reporting decreased over time with increased reflagging to West African countries and catches being reported as domestic, it remained relatively high. Total legal catches were estimated to be, on average, 11 times higher than reported catches between 2000 and 2010 (Table 1). Illegal catches by Chinese fleets averaged over 357,000 t·year-1 in the 1980s, gradually increasing to around 761,000 t·year-1 between 2000 and 2010 (Fig. 2).
Legal EU fleet catches in West Africa were estimated at 155,000 t·year-1 in the 1950s, peaking at 3.5 million t·year-1 in the mid-1970s before declining to 1.8 million t·year-1 on average between 2000 and 2010 (Fig. 2). Of this, only 524,000 t·year-1 were officially reported to the FAO (30%). Illegal (or unregulated) EU fleet catches were estimated at 92,000 t·year-1 in the 1960s, rising to around 404,000 t·year-1 in the 1970s, equaling Chinese illegal catches in the early 1980s, and then decreasing to around 224,000 t·year-1 between 2000 and 2010 (Fig. 2).
European legal catches were dominant, averaging 3.2 million t·year-1 in the 1980s before China’s significant entry into West African fisheries, and were equivalent to Chinese legal fleet catches in the early 2000s (Fig. 2). The decline in EU catches from West African waters over time, contrasted with increasing Chinese catches in 2000-2010, might suggest a gradual replacement of European fleets by Chinese fleets. However, a more likely explanation for the EU catch decrease is the growth of EU fleet reflagging to West African countries, e.g., Senegal [43]. While Chinese reflagging practices are more easily identified, the post-colonial relationships between EU member states and some West African countries obscure the distinction between reflagged fleets and genuinely domestic fleets.
2. Economic Value: Landed Value of West African Fisheries
Between 2000 and 2010, catches worth $8.3 billion USD were taken by EU ($3.7 billion USD) and Chinese ($4.7 billion USD) fleets in West Africa (Table 3). The majority of this value (and catch volume) originated from Morocco (see Table 1), particularly from the former Spanish Sahara (68%). Of the $3.7 billion USD value of EU catches, 4% ($0.2 billion USD) was from illegal fishing, while $1.7 billion USD of the $4.7 billion USD Chinese catch was considered illegal (40%). Over 90% of the landed value by legal EU fleets came from Morocco, Mauritania, Cape Verde, and Guinea, while illegal EU catches were mainly from Mauritania, Senegal, and Liberia (Table 3). Similarly, over 96% of the legal landed value by China was from Morocco (including Western Sahara), Mauritania, Angola, Cape Verde, and Congo (Brazzaville). Most illegal Chinese fishing (87% of illegal landed value) appears concentrated around Morocco, Nigeria, and to a lesser extent, Mauritania (Table 3).
3. Compensation and Equity: Comparing EU and Chinese Agreements
European Fishing Agreements and Equity
Europe paid an average of $307 million USD·year-1 for West African waters access from 2000 to 2010 (Table 3). The highest cumulative access fees were paid to Morocco ($180 million USD·year-1) and Mauritania ($95 million USD·year-1), followed by Senegal and Angola. The official EU compensation rate, the ratio of access value to reported landings value, was estimated at 26% (Table 3). This suggests the EU returns about a quarter of the value of their reported catches from West Africa, which seems reasonable, especially for Mauritania, which appears to receive 100% of the reported landed value by EU fleets (Table 3). However, when compensation is calculated as the ratio of access value to total landed value (including illegal catches – see Table 1), the rate drops significantly to an average of 8% (Table 3), ranging from 0% (countries without agreements but with documented catches: Benin, Sierra Leone, Togo, Liberia, Ghana) to 23% (Mauritania, Table 3).
Despite the substantial financial compensation paid by the EU to Morocco under FPAs ($180 million USD, Table 3), it represents only 7% of the actual landed value of total catches (Table 3). Regionally, Morocco accounts for 28% of total catches but 59% of agreement fees, while Mauritania, with a third of total catches, receives only 30% of agreement fees. The EU pays approximately $345 USD·t-1 to Morocco, compared to $154 USD·t-1 to Mauritania.
Chinese Fishing Agreements and Equity
Estimating Chinese access fees required detailed investigation of media and news reports (see S1 Table and S1 Materials). The limited transparency of Chinese agreements hindered identifying all payments, even with evidence of agreements (Table 3), and separating sums for fisheries from other sectors, potentially causing an upward bias. We hope these biases may partially offset each other.
Chinese access fees (S1 Results and Discussion) were categorized into three types:
We estimated that Chinese agreements provided an average of $166 million USD·year-1 in access fees from 2000 to 2010 (Table 3). However, not all Chinese access fees were ascertainable due to the opaque nature of these agreements [67]. The official Chinese compensation rate is estimated at 40%, compared to an actual compensation rate of 4% when including illegal catches and adjusting the value to exclude countries with undocumented access fees (‘Adjusted values’ in Table 3). The actual Chinese compensation rate (4%) is half the EU rate (8%) (Table 3). Significant regional variation exists in agreement values for the same species. While the Moroccan agreement represented 5% of the total, Chinese catches from Morocco were 26%, translating to $15 USD·t-1 compared to $121 USD·t-1 paid to Mauritania.
Applying stricter criteria for fisheries-related Chinese projects, excluding potentially non-fisheries projects worth $15 million USD·year-1 (e.g., $0.67 million for Côte d’Ivoire, $2 million for Cape Verde, $2.74 million for Guinea Bissau, $4 million for Ghana), reduces the Chinese compensation rate from 4% to 3%. Calculations using these adjusted figures yielded a total of $15 million USD·year-1.
Despite these differences in average compensation rates, the high variance around the means for both EU and China means that they are not statistically significantly different (t-test, p = 0.05).
Discussion
This study reveals a trend of increasing under-reporting of catches by the EU in West African waters, while Chinese under-reporting, although higher, may be decreasing. This could reflect the growing trend of reflagging Chinese fleets, leading to lower fees as “domestic vessels” often pay less.
Under-reporting masks overfishing and directly harms local economies and sustainability. For instance, EU fleets increased catches from Morocco and Western Sahara by 5% after 1995 despite an EU-Morocco agreement to reduce the EU quota by 40% [54]. Foreign fleets undermine the development of domestic fisheries by threatening long-term stock sustainability [68]. This has led Mauritania to exclude octopus from the new EU-Mauritania FPA [69], now supposedly only accessible to ‘domestic’ fisheries, which are often reflagged Chinese and European vessels [28,70–72]. Undervalued catches, weak bargaining power, and secrecy in agreement negotiations contribute to significant financial discrepancies [68], especially with China, where reflagging further minimizes license fees.
The estimated landed value of catches taken by EU and Chinese fleets from West African waters, $8.4 billion USD·year-1, excludes added value from processing and marketing, which could increase it by approximately 40% [7,70], raising the annual value to $11.8 billion USD·year-1. This is equivalent to the average net development assistance and official aid received by these West African countries from all nations between 2000 and 2010 (http://www.worldbank.org). The difference between these landed values and payments to West African countries represents a fraction of the total economic loss, but reasonably approximates the gross revenues from legal fisheries (excluding Namibia). West African governments earned approximately $0.5 billion, or 6%, excluding local landing, processing, and employment value, which is relatively low.
Other factors worsen this situation. Bribes paid by foreign companies for resource access can lead to ecological and human rights abuses, as countries heavily reliant on natural resource exports are more prone to corruption in resource sales [27]. From a sustainability perspective, UNCLOS agreements are justified by the difference between domestic catches and potentially sustainable catch levels. However, concerns arise when components beyond landings are considered and this surplus is exceeded. UNCLOS also mandates that fishing access agreements should not harm local development and livelihoods.
If tangible projects (e.g., port development) have a greater positive economic impact than direct cash payments, especially in high-corruption countries, China’s approach to compensation seems strategic. However, both Chinese and EU fishing agreements negatively impact host countries’ food security [7,11,24,54].
The pattern of Europe paying low fees for developing countries’ fisheries, as confirmed here, was previously documented for African nations like Madagascar and Seychelles [7,8,38]. Our estimated 8% compensation rate is relatively high compared to earlier findings. While Chinese projects in lieu of cash may be appealing to highly corrupt countries, their lower value than EU fees might be linked to higher under-reporting and the study potentially not capturing the full value of each agreement. However, regional variations exist, with China having higher compensation rates than the EU in some countries (Cape Verde, Guinea, Sierra Leone, Ghana, Gabon), making overall compensation rates statistically similar. We suggest that both EU and Chinese compensation rates are generally low, pending further detailed studies.
While Chinese fishing agreements and joint ventures are often opaque, China’s performance regarding under-reporting and illegal practices appears similar to that of European countries. Foreign fishing contributes to stock overexploitation, income and nutritional challenges for local communities [9], and fisheries suffering from imported overcapacity and overexploitation. This has driven Senegalese artisanal fishers to fish illegally in Mauritanian waters [43], increased costs for Guinean fishers, and led Mauritania to enforce closed octopus fishing seasons for artisanal fishers [73]. These impacts extend beyond socio-economics, causing decreased average fish size and catch per unit effort [74,75], and ultimately ‘importing’ marine stock depletion rather than exporting fisheries resources [8,26].
While Chinese agreements may be strategic for economic development, they often lack financial support for monitoring, surveillance, and scientific research. The EU emphasizes monitoring and surveillance but underpays for these crucial activities [7], evidenced by the high presence of illegal vessels, including EU vessels, in West African EEZs. EU fleet owners, like most foreign fleet owners, often deny host country observers onboard. This lack of crucial enforcement components contributes to increased illegal fishing. Although Chinese fleets are increasingly responsible for IUU practices in West Africa, including unlicensed fishing, illegal gear, and trans-shipping, EU operators also contribute to significant illegal catches.
Recommendations for fairer, more equitable, and transparent access agreements and sustainable fisheries include: applying the principle of Monitoring the Monitor [76] to ensure monitoring fees are properly used; increasing agreement transparency and inter-governmental communication to foster competition among DWF countries and potentially raise access fees, improving West African countries’ negotiating position; negotiating regional agreements to enhance collective bargaining power; regional regulatory responsibilities and enforcement of MSC agreements like the right of pursuit; establishing an accessible registry of reflagging and flag-of-convenience vessels; and replacing ineffective GRT measures with more appropriate allocation measures like species quotas. Fishing access agreement funds should be specifically allocated to establishing and enforcing these criteria and supporting scientific research and training.
While the EU has prioritized fish stock rebuilding in its own waters, its DWF capacity has contributed to overfishing in West Africa. Both the EU and China need to act more responsibly regarding fisheries in West Africa. Sanctions should be applied against vessels denying observer access or exceeding quotas. Efforts should focus on enforcing existing fishing agreement measures (e.g., banning destructive gear, enforcing quota and by-catch limits) and capacity building in African countries, particularly for enhancing local MCS capabilities.
From a development perspective, African countries should prioritize access to operators who offload catches in local ports to promote value-added processing and marketing.
Beyond the potential bias from the opacity of Chinese fishing agreements, this study is limited by its inability to further document the economic and political conditions under which agreements were negotiated, which significantly influence access and fees. Some Chinese access fees may have been excluded due to difficulties in separating fisheries-specific components from other elements and potential bribes. Further investigation into these fees is needed to reduce bias. Future research could compare non-monetary aspects of fishing agreements, such as contributions to MCS, scientific research, training, sustainability clauses, and their implementation.
Supporting Information
S1 Materials. Materials and methods for estimating the annual value of Chinese legal access to West African fishing grounds, 2000–2010.
https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0118351.s001
(DOCX)
S1 References. Other references used in S1 Table for the assessment of the fees paid by China for access to the EEZs of West African countries.
https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0118351.s002
(DOCX)
S1 Results and Discussion. Results and main findings summarized from the assessment presented in S1 Table.
https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0118351.s003
(DOCX)
S1 Table. Materials for estimating the annual value of Chinese legal access to West African fishing grounds, 2000–2010.
https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0118351.s004
(DOCX)
Acknowledgments
This work is a contribution from the Sea Around Us project, under the “Marine Conservation Research, Collaboration and Support in West Africa” project, funded by the MAVA Foundation. The Sea Around Us is a scientific initiative at the University of British Columbia, supported by The Pew Charitable Trusts and the Paul G. Allen Family Foundation. We extend our gratitude to Frederic Le Manach and Dr. Wilf Swartz for their valuable feedback on the initial draft. We also thank colleagues from African institutions who preferred to remain anonymous, and Dr. Francis K.E. Nunoo for his insightful comments.
Author Contributions
DB and VWYL conceived and designed the experiments, while DB performed them. DB and DP analyzed the data. DZ, URS, PLB, EAK, and DP contributed reagents, materials, and analysis tools. DB and DP were responsible for writing the manuscript.
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