Non-Participation in the Fish Stocks Agreement: Status and Reasons

Abstract

Although the Fish Stocks Agreement was adopted by consensus after around only 2.5 years of negotiation, the final text did not fully resolve all significant differences of view. As it was feared that participation in the Fish Stocks Agreement would remain as troublesome as in the 1958 Geneva Fisheries Convention, considerable efforts have been made to promote wider participation since the Agreement’s entry into force in 2001. On 22 November 2010 there were 78 parties to the Fish Stocks Agreement and 161 to the Law of the Sea Convention. This article examines the current status and reasons for non-participation in the Fish Stocks Agreement by, inter alia, categorizing non-participation, appraising participation in light of the current participation in the Law of the Sea Convention and examining the relationship between the Agreement and regional fisheries management organizations.