Over 430 Chinese boats suspected of illegal fishing in Argentinian waters: Report

An analysis by the group Oceana recently found that hundreds of boats, most of them Chinese, had hidden their movements near Argentinian waters during the last three years and were potentially engaged in illegal fishing in the lucrative area. According to the report, more than half of the foreign ships fishing near Argentina had turned off their tracking system in a bid to hide their activities. Oceana said that 66 per cent of the fleet that was responsible for the incidents belonged to China. 

The report by the Oceana group stated that about 800 vessels, over half of them from China, logged nearly 900,000 hours of visible fishing activity via the Automatic Identification System (AIS) within 20 nautical miles of Argentina's waters between January 2018 and April 2021. More than half of those boats “went dark” in over 6,200 “gap events”, when their AIS was turned of for at least 24 hours. The Oceana report found that more than 430 mainland Chinese-flagged vessels were responsible for almost 70 per cent of visible fishing in Argentina’s waters. 

Beth Lowell, the deputy vice-president for US campaigns at Oceana said, “You shouldn't be hiding where you are in the oceans when you're fishing. Why did they turn it off if they're doing something legal? They should be keeping their AIS on so the world can see what's happening”. 

He added, "The vessels that disappeared along the edge of the national waters of Argentina could be pillaging its waters illegally”. 

Chinese ships in South America 

South China Morning Post reported that Chinese ships have been converging around the waters of South American countries such as Argentina and Ecuador, with the massive Chinese fleet and instances of illegal fishing attracting criticism and involving run-ins with the law. Oceana also found that 173 - about 40 per cent - of Chinese vessels that fished near Argentina had transshipments within a month of their AIS being turned off. Further, apart from Chinese boats,  Spanish, South Korean and Taiwanese ships accounted for about 26 per cent between them of the visible activities, while Argentinian ships conducted less than 1 per cent of the total fishing. 

(With inputs from ANI)