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Tuesday, May 02, 2006
Tuna producers fear approval of WTO tariff
GENERAL Santos City - A sector of tuna producers warned the government last week against giving its approval to a World Trade Organization (WTO)-imposed tariff schedule on Non-Agricultural Market Access (Nama) products that would include tuna and tuna-like species.
Arsenio Tanchuling, executive director of the Tambuyog Development Center, said the tuna handline sector would be hit hard once the government agrees to include tuna and other tuna-like products among those to be bound and subjected to the WTO tariff-reduction formula on Nama products.
Handline tuna producers in the city is composed of over 2,500 large pump boats and employ at least 40,000 fishermen.
Low tariffs
The group alone lands over 30,000 metric tons of high value tuna, according to industry records.
“The binding of tuna will initially subject the product to a tariff reduction rate of up to 48 percent, after which further reductions will be applied until tariff is reduced to zero. This process obliges the government to cut further its already low tariffs in tuna and, in turn, deprive locally produced tuna of protection from cheap imported tuna,” Tanchuling said.
Tambuyog’s concerns echo the Alliance of Tuna Handliners’ demand for the government’s exclusion of tuna from the list of Nama items to be bound in the WTO.
Exclusion list
In an April 18-letter addressed to the Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources, the alliance, headed by Dario Lauron, listed yellow-fin tuna, big-eye tuna, albacore and blue marlin as among those that must be in the exclusion list.
Tanchuling expressed their support to the alliance’s demand since “the exclusion list would shield sensitive products from adverse impacts of WTO tariff reduction policies.”
Tambuyog feared that since the protective mechanism of tariff is removed once tuna is subjected to WTO policies, its ultimate result is the loss of livelihood of small handline fishers.
“We already had a preview of this effect when the government implemented Fisheries Administrative Order 195, the price of tuna shot down from P120 to P60 a kilo since 2003, resulting to the non-operation of 71 out of 119 fishing boats and job loss for 2,380 handline fishers in this city,” Tan-chuling stressed.
Fisheries Administrative Order 195 is a fishing ordinance that allows the entry of non-export grade tunas in the course of transhipment of fish products by foreign companies. (RBS/Sun.Star General San-tos/Sunnex)
For Bisaya stories from Cebu. Click here. (May 2, 2006 issue)
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