The Changing International Law Of High Seas Fisheries

This book examines legal, economic and environmental developments including recent state and international practice.

This book is the first comprehensive examination of state practice relating to enforcement by non-flag states of the high seas conservation and management measures adopted by Regional Fisheries Organisations. It demonstrates that an exception is emerging in customary international law to the rule of the primacy of flag state jurisdiction in the high seas fisheries context.

In Filling Regulatory Gaps in High Seas Fisheries, author Yoshinobu Takei investigates the regime of high seas fisheries from the perspective of international law and considers whether there are regulatory gaps in high seas fisheries and, if so, how they should be filled. The book focuses on topical issues such as the management of deep-sea fisheries on the high seas and the protection of vulnerable marine ecosystems. In view of the current state of marine fisheries resources, together with ecosystem concerns, swift and effective action is required to improve fisheries management, in particular for high seas fisheries. Takei thoroughly analyzes the current state of affairs and convincingly suggests steps to be taken in the future.

The call by the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development for New Negotiation to improve conservation of high seas fishing stocks again challenges the capacity of international law to cope with emerging problems. Examining past and current experience, The New International Law of Fisheries considers the revolutionary changes in the international law of the sea that reached their final stages in the 1970s and discusses their impact on state protection and customary law. It focuses upon the 1982 Convention on the Law of the Sea, particularly the provisions on the exclusive economic zone where the bulk of world fishing occurs, as well as the major international decisions on high seas fishing, including driftnets, the harvesting of particular species, including salmon, tuna, and marine mammals, and the states that occupy coastal areas of national jurisdiction and high seas. This new study should be of particular interest to international lawyers interested in environmental law and the law of the sea and to states where fishing plays a vital economic role.

This collection addresses the central question of how the current international framework for the regulation of fisheries may be strengthened in order to meet the challenges posed by changing fisheries and ocean conditions, in particular climate change. International fisheries law has developed significantly since the 1990s, through the adoption and establishment of international instruments and bodies at the global and regional levels. Global fish stocks nevertheless remain in a troubling state, and fisheries management authorities face a wide array of internal and external challenges, including operational constraints, providing effective management advice in the face of scientific uncertainty and non-compliance by States with their international obligations. This book examines these challenges and identifies options and pathways to strengthen international fisheries law. While it has a primarily legal focus, it also features significant contributions from specialists drawn from other disciplines, notably fisheries science, economics, policy and international relations, in order to provide a fuller context to the legal, policy and management issues raised. Rigorous and comprehensive in scope, this will be essential reading for lawyers and non-lawyers interested in international fisheries regulation in the context of profoundly changing ocean conditions.

This book provides new insights into how change occurs in international law, through a uniquely comprehensive analysis of the mechanisms that allow the 'old' treaty-framework of the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea to respond to changing circumstances.