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Abstract

In 2015, the international community adopted the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), a goal-setting governance strategy that aims to achieve sustainable development across social, economic, and ecological areas. SDG 14 (‘life below water’) is directed to the sustainable use and conservation of the oceans and marine resources. Regional fisheries management organizations (RFMOs) are key institutions in managing international fisheries and thus have the potential to play a significant role in realizing the attainment of SDG 14. This paper aims to assess how RFMOs could contribute to SDG 14 by examining their treaty texts and implementation of conservation and management measures or collaborative networks. The results of this paper highlights the contribution of RFMOs to targets such as ending overfishing and indicates the need for further attention towards area protection. The findings of the network assessment show that RFMOs mainly cooperate with other RFMOs or fisheries-related organizations, indicating a lack of cooperation with other maritime organizations. Moreover, the objective of most of these collaborations is sharing of information or data, while actions against problems such as the bycatch of non-target species are missing. Thus, this paper highlights how existing regional organizations have the potential to increase their contribution to SDG 14, by aligning more of their work to this goal. To support this process, we developed a list of considerations and actions.

Item Type:	Article
Authors/Creators:	Haas, B and Haward, M and McGee, J and Fleming, A
Keywords:	Sustainable Development Goals, regional fisheries, ocean governance, fisheries management, high seas, regional organizations, United Nations
Journal or Publication Title:	International Environmental Agreements: Politics, Law and Economics
Publisher:	Springer Netherlands
ISSN:	1567-9764
DOI / ID Number:	10.1007/s10784-020-09491-7
Copyright Information:	© Springer Nature B.V. 2020
Related URLs:	Google Scholar: Haward, M UTAS Profile: Haward, M Google Scholar: McGee, J UTAS Profile: McGee, J
Item Statistics:	View statistics for this item

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