On June 27, 2022, President Joseph R. Biden, Jr. signed a National Security Memorandum on Combating Illegal, Unreported, and Unregulated Fishing and Associated Labor Abuses.Footnote ¹ The announcement coincided with the opening of the UN Ocean Conference in Lisbon, which focused on ocean sustainability.Footnote ² It also came ten days after the adoption by the World Trade Organization (WTO) Ministerial Conference of the Agreement on Fisheries Subsidies, which banned government subsidies to “a vessel or operator engaged in illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing.”Footnote ³ IUU fishing and related practices, the National Security Memorandum notes, “are among the greatest threats to ocean health and are significant causes of global overfishing, contributing to the collapse or decline of fisheries that are critical to the economic growth, food systems, and ecosystems of numerous countries around the world.”Footnote ⁴ Such fishing “often involves forced labor, a form of human trafficking, and other crimes and human rights abuses.”Footnote ⁵ For these reasons, the Memorandum explains, “IUU fishing and associated labor abuses undermine U.S. economic competitiveness, national security, fishery sustainability, and the livelihoods and human rights of fishers around the world and will exacerbate the environmental and socioeconomic effects of climate change.”Footnote ⁶ To better meet the threat, the Memorandum, the first of its kind on the subject, systematically and in some detail “direct[s] agencies to increase coordination among themselves and with diverse stakeholders—public and private, foreign and domestic—to address” IUU fishing and associated labor abuses.Footnote ⁷ The Memorandum's goals are threefold: “to work toward ending forced labor and other crimes or abuses in IUU fishing; promote sustainable use of the oceans in partnership with other nations and the private sector; and advance foreign and trade policies that benefit U.S. seafood workers.”Footnote ⁸

The United States is the largest importer of seafood worldwide. Between 70–85 percent of the seafood consumed in the United States comes from imports.Footnote ⁹ An estimated “$2.4 billion worth of seafood imports [into the United States] [were] derived from [IUU] fishing in 2019, or nearly 11 percent of total U.S. seafood imports.”Footnote ¹⁰ A substantial portion of those imports came from China, Indonesia, Mexico, Russia, and Vietnam.Footnote ¹¹ Eliminating IUU imports, the International Trade Commission has concluded, “would increase total operating income of the U.S. commercial fishing industry by an estimated $60.8 million.”Footnote ¹² According to a 2021 National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) report, 43 percent of audited U.S. seafood importing permits were non-compliant, indicating deficiencies in chain of custody documentation suggestive of IUU fishing.Footnote ¹³ The prevalence of labor abuses in IUU fishing is well-documented.Footnote ¹⁴

Over the past two decades, U.S. law has gradually established, expanded, and prioritized the government's ability to combat IUU fishing, increasingly linking it with labor abuses. The Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Reauthorization Act (2006) required the secretary of commerce to list “a nation if fishing vessels of that nation are engaged, or have been engaged at any point during the preceding 2 years [now 3 years], in illegal, unreported, or unregulated fishing.”Footnote ¹⁵ Such listing could result in the denial of U.S. port privileges to that nation's vessels.Footnote ¹⁶ Accordingly, after Mexico was identified for IUU fishing in 2019 and received a negative certification in 2021, “Mexican fishing vessels that fish in the Gulf of Mexico . . . [were] prohibited from entering U.S. ports” effective February 7 this year, the first time such action has been taken.Footnote ¹⁷ The Port State Measures Agreement Act (2015) permits the secretary of commerce to deny port entry to, among others, a listed IUU vessel or a vessel that the secretary “has reasonable grounds to believe . . . engaged in IUU fishing or fishing related activities in support of such fishing.”Footnote ¹⁸ The Seaford Import Monitoring Program (2016), instituted by regulation, “establishe[d] permitting, reporting and recordkeeping procedures relating to the importation of certain fish and fish products, identified as being at particular risk of illegal, unreported, and unregulated (IUU) fishing or seafood fraud.”Footnote ¹⁹ Currently, “more than 1,100 unique species, categorized in 13 species groups,” amounting to about half of U.S. seafood imports, are covered by the Seafood Import Monitoring Program (SIMP).Footnote ²⁰ The Maritime Security and Fisheries Enforcement (SAFE) Act (2019) made it U.S. policy to “take action to curtail the global trade in seafood and seafood products derived from IUU fishing, including its links to forced labor and transnational organized illegal activity.”Footnote ²¹ It outlined programs for doing so, such as coordination with international organizations, the engagement of diplomatic missions, law enforcement assistance to priority countries, information sharing, improvement of capacities for transparency and traceability, and promoting the use of technology.Footnote ²² And it established an Interagency Working Group on IUU Fishing composed of twenty-one departments, agencies, and offices within the Executive Branch.Footnote ²³

The Memorandum directs executive departments and agencies to take numerous actions to counter IUU fishing and abusive labor practices. Stating that the “United States is committed to promoting labor rights and human rights and fundamental freedoms through worker-centered trade policies, and to working to eliminate abusive labor practices, in particular forced labor, in supply chains,” agencies are to take actions such as engaging in trade negotiations, enhancing public diplomacy, conducting investigations, employing sanctions and visa restrictions, disseminating information, providing training and technical support, and raising public awareness.Footnote ²⁴ Declaring that it is “the policy of [the] Administration to revitalize U.S. leadership in multilateral institutions, including regional bodies,” agencies are directed “to collaborate with these organizations,” including the Food and Agriculture Organization, the International Labor Organization, the International Maritime Organization, ASEAN, and regional fisheries management organizations.Footnote ²⁵ Asserting that the “United States benefits from an unparalleled ability to shape global discourse and convene stakeholders from government, civil society, and the private sector,” agencies are instructed to cooperate with partner countries and private organizations, including “fishers, fish processing workers, port workers, and relevant trade unions.”Footnote ²⁶ Finally, leveraging U.S. market power, agencies are to “combat abuses and to strengthen incentives for ethical behavior in the global seafood industry, including by limiting the market for products derived from IUU fishing, forced labor, or other abusive labor practices,” through, for example, expanding SIMP to include additional species groups and utilizing trade authorities such as countervailing duties and Section 301 of the Trade Act of 1974.Footnote ²⁷

Concurrent with the issuance of the Memorandum, the administration announced additional actions to combat IUU fishing.Footnote ²⁸ They included the launch at the UN Ocean Conference of the IUU Fishing Action Alliance, a partnership that now includes four members: Canada, Iceland, the United Kingdom, and the United States.Footnote ²⁹ Action Alliance members “pledge to take urgent action to improve the monitoring, control, and surveillance of fisheries, increase transparency in fishing fleets and in the seafood market, and build new partnerships that will hold bad actors accountable.”Footnote ³⁰ The White House also disclosed that NOAA would issue a proposed rule to the International Fisheries Regulations to enhance its ability to address IUU fishing and forced labor in the seafood supply chain. Among other things, the proposed rule broadens the definition of IUU fishing in the regulations implementing the High Seas Driftnet Fishing Moratorium Protection Act.Footnote ³¹ It also expands the information that foreign vessels that seek to enter U.S. ports are required to provide.Footnote ³²

Issuance of the Memorandum raised questions about its possible link to U.S. China policy, since China has a large and active distant water fishing fleet, has been ranked worst in an index of “vulnerability to, prevalence of and response to” IUU fishing, and was identified by NOAA for having vessels that are involved in IUU fishing.Footnote ³³ A senior administration official emphasized that the Memorandum “is not about any one specific country.”Footnote ³⁴ That said, the person continued, “The PRC is a leading contributor to IUU fishing worldwide, and it has impeded progress on the development of measures to combat IUU fishing and overfishing in international organizations. And the PRC has a responsibility to uphold these commitments as a flag state and actively monitor and correct the activities of [its] fishing fleet activities in other countries’ waters . . . including preventing its vessels from fishing outside coastal states’ license agreements or without a license to fish at all.”Footnote ³⁵