06 June 2017

08:30 - 09:45 hrs. Conference Room 6

New York

, United States of America

With the 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda, Heads of State have signed on to the goal of prohibiting subsidies that contribute to overfishing, and to illegal and unregulated fishing by 2020.

Such fisheries subsidy forecasts amount between US$ 20 to US$ 35 billion contributing to natural resource declines, as well as to ecosystem deterioration, unemployment, poverty and food insecurity. In addition, they create distortions in international markets and may contribute to greenhouse gas emissions.

91 countries, 4 Intergovernmental Organizations and more than 15 Civil Society Organizations backed the joint UNCTAD, FAO and UN Environment initiative (at the UNCTAD 14 Conference in Nairobi, July 2016) effectively signing onto a roadmap to end such harmful and distortive fisheries subsidies and move toward a sustainable trading path.

This session aims to gather actors to discuss next steps for accelerating the removal of harmful fisheries subsidies and for converging on a global agreement. It will also seek to encourage the deposit of voluntary commitments by Member States to reform and ultimately phase-out harmful fishery subsidies.

The objective is to build on the momentum created by the joint declaration and focus on scaling the delivery of the four-point action plan toward a call for a binding global agreement on fisheries subsidies at 11th WTO Ministerial Conference.