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This innovative legal tool has placed the EU at the forefront of efforts to address pirate fishing. Whilst it has the potential to leave a positive legacy in the fight against IUU fishing, evidence demonstrates that a lack of coordination and uniformity in its implementation risks compromising its intended objectives.

Diversions of fish consignments to Member State ports with poorer controls than those of their neighbours and a growing trend in containerisation of fish suggest a need for more consistent implementation efforts and increased trade flow scrutiny. The absence of any vessels in the IUU Vessel Community List identified independently by Member States or by the European Commission is also concerning.

The report exposes severe human rights abuses associated with human trafficking in Thailand's fishing industry and documents the testimonies of Burmese workers, as young as 16, who were forced onto fishing vessels for many months and subjected to arduous, often violent, working conditions without pay.

The report details testimonies of crew murdered at sea, and on shore, and the shocking figure from a 2009 survey by the United Nations Inter-Agency Project on Human Trafficking (UNIAP) that found 59% of interviewed migrants trafficked aboard Thai fishing boats reported witnessing the murder of a fellow worker.

Transhipment at Sea: The Need for a Ban in West Africa draws heavily on the evidence EJF has gathered through its work towards the eradication of IUU, or ‘pirate’ fishing in West Africa. It explains how the international movement of fisheries products – both legal and illegal – often depends upon transhipments. The complexities involvement in fisheries regulations mean that transhipments can be problematic and are often linked to illegal fishing activities. EJF’s call on coastal and flag States to ban transhipments at sea in West Africa is part of the wider effort to combat IUU, or ‘pirate’, fishing.

This new briefing discusses the lack of control in authorised transhipments and the fact that illegal transhipment at sea is widely used by IUU fishing vessels to gain access to market. It makes the case for a ban on transhipments of fish at sea in West Africa as well as a ban on the entry of seafood from such transhipments into the European market.

This report by EJF exposes the continued role of the European Union and East Asian countries in facilitating a market for seafood illegally caught in West Africa. Following a two-year investigation by The Environmental Justice Foundation (EJF), “Pirate Fishing Exposed: The Fight Against Illegal Fishing in West Africa and the EU” highlights how local fishing communities are fighting back to combat this illegal trade.

During the two-year surveillance investigation, EJF documented rampant pirate fishing in Sierra Leone and laundering of the illegal catch into the European seafood market by vessels accredited to export fish to the EU.