Why Does Congress Care about Fish?
July 21st, 2008
It’s simple! Because governments are paying their commercial fleets to overfish our oceans.
The World Trade Organization (WTO) is currently considering a proposal to eliminate fisheries subsidies as part of its Doha trade round. This is important because more than 75 percent of the world’s fisheries are now overexploited, fully exploited, significantly depleted or recovering from overexploitation.
Last week, House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Charles Rangel (D-NY) and Trade Subcommittee Chairman Sander Levin (D-MI), joined by a bipartisan group of 10 committee members, showed their support by urging U.S. Trade Representative Susan Schwab to make the “phasing out and elimination of destructive fisheries subsidies one of the Administration’s trade priorities.”
The Ways and Means Committee letter follows a series of actions by the U.S. Congress on fisheries subsidies. In 2007, both the U.S. House and Senate passed resolutions calling for international leadership by the United States to ban destructive fisheries subsidies (H.Con.Res.94, S.Res.208). In addition, the Ways and Means Committee has its own resolution on the issue, H. Res. 814.
Starting today, July 21, trade ministers will convene in Geneva for critical WTO negotiations on agriculture and industrial goods (NAMA). Although fisheries subsidies is not on the limited agenda for the ministerial meeting, it remains an important component of the overall Doha trade round.
Permalink | Comment on this post (0)
By
