Let us not forget our fishers

Si Pilemon, si Pilemon

Namasol sa karagatan

Nakakuha, nakakuha

Ng isdang tambasakan

Guibaligya, Guibaligya

Sa merkadong guba

Ang halin puros kura

Ang halin puros kura

Igo ra ipanuba

This traditional Visayan song is likely the first song many Filipinos hear about fishing. Meant to be humorous – the fisherman’s catch is so small the proceeds can only buy him a drink of tuba – it also unfortunately encapsulates the typical life of fishers, many of whom live precarious lives where their efforts are exploited for meager returns.

Much has been said about our fishers suffering poor and unsafe working conditions without proper compensation and being deprived of the most basic of needs, such as food and drinking water. Being indebted to employers and other creditors even before they leave the shores, they are coerced to working inhumanely long hours aboard vessels – 20 to 21 hours of work, where sleeping four hours a day is considered a luxury.

Despite our knowledge of the suffering that they endure, it has been shown that the trafficked fishers are lost in the system. Since they are not being effectively identified as victims of human trafficking, they are not protected. They rarely get into our justice and welfare systems because our systems do not actively look for them in the same way that we look for other victims of trafficking.

The recent passage of the Magna Carta for Seafarers, far from benefitting fishers, instead merely highlights their plight as those that work on fishing vessels are explicitly excluded from the coverage of the Magna Carta. Fishers are among the poorest of the basic sectors, with an average annual compensation just above the poverty threshold. Many factors contribute to this: the uncertainty of seasonal work, irregular pay, the risk of wage theft, exploitative practices, hazardous conditions and a lack of a social security safety net, which all contribute to make the life of a fisher a precarious one.

It is high time that the State codified rights and standards for fishers, protect them through tangible actions and positive law. Without laws specifically and explicitly created to safeguard the rights of fishers, they will fall through the gaps of the law and continue to be unprotected and overlooked.

Fortunately, a document already exists that would help address many of the major issues faced by our fishers. The International Labor Organization (ILO) created ILO Convention No. 188, or the Work in Fishing Convention in 2007 and it went into force in 2017. It was created to set the basic standards of decent work in the fishing industry, because the ILO acknowledged that fishers have conditions of work that are different from those experienced by workers in other sectors. Their work is not only hazardous, but takes place often in an environment where there is no clear separation between working time and personal time, many fishers living and working on the same cramped vessel.

The Convention was written to apply to all fishers and fishing vessels engaged in commercial fishing operations, with a fisher being defined as “every person employed or engaged in any capacity or carrying out an occupation on board any fishing vessel, including persons working on board who are paid on the basis of a share of the catch but excluding pilots, naval personnel, other persons in the permanent service of a government, shore-based persons carrying out work aboard a fishing vessel and fisheries observers.” The Convention attempts to tackle many of the persistent issues in the fishing industry, setting standards for manning and hours of work, recruitment and placement, wages, accommodation and safety. It attempts to address the issue of fatigue – endemic in a job with long working hours and insufficient rest periods – as well as repatriation, the need for a free method of transmitting payment to the families of fishers and the right of fishers to be taken ashore promptly for medical treatment when they suffer serious injuries and illnesses. The latter achieves a special urgency, given how seafarers in general were treated during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic.

For Convention 188 to be effective in protecting our fishers, it is imperative that we ratify it. There are resolutions that have been filed in Congress – Senate Bill 534 from Senator Joel Villanueva and House Bill 2059 from Representative Raymond Mendoza – which urge for the immediate ratification of the Convention, and more must be done to support these calls for ratification. The ratification of the convention will allow our fishers to be folded into the ambit of protections and common standards between the ratifying jurisdictions and allows for the principle of reciprocity to function between States.

Of course, even the ratification of the Convention is no magic bullet – there is much that would still need to be done to facilitate its enforcement, including the potential passage of an enabling law and an alignment of our current laws and standards with those found in the Convention, as well as best practices abroad. There must be an accompanying information and education drive as well, as all the rights in the world will not benefit the fishers if they are unaware of them or of how to properly assert them.

Moreover, there are other issues that plague fishers that deserve to be addressed, such as the need for a digital database of vessel information; the publication of lists of fishing licenses, punishments for fisheries crimes and vessel tracking data (including the need to give all vessels a unique number); a ban on transferring fish between boats at sea unless carefully monitored and the end of the use of flags of convenience for fishing vessels.

But the first step must be the ratification of the Convention, not only for the protections that this brings, but to show that the Philippines is committed to the protection and advancement of fishers, that the State sees them and their specific needs.

Every Pilemon deserves more than a glass of tuba – we owe them protection, attention and regulation. It’s a new year, a new time – time to give Filipino fishers what they are due.