Thailand reacts to 'yellow card' from EU

Thailand warned on Wednesday that it risked losing nearly $1 billion a year if the European Union makes good on a threat to ban fish imports unless the kingdom does more to halt illegal fishing.

The world's third-largest seafood producer was left red-faced on Tuesday when Brussels issued it a "yellow card" for failing to clamp down on illegal fishing, saying fisheries monitoring, controls and punishments were inadequate and had to be brought up to international standards.

A "red card", including a ban on imports, could follow if the kingdom fails to clean up its industry in six months, the EU Commission warned.

Thai Agriculture Minister Petipong Puengbun Na Ayudhya told reporters on Wednesday that a ban could cost the country up to 30 billion baht a year ($927 million) in European sales - a shortfall the economically shaky nation can ill afford.

"I am confident that our private sector, fishermen and our fisheries operators are aware that if we fail to solve this problem, our fishing industries will be faced with several problems," he said.

Petipong said he was confident Bangkok would meet the EU's six-month deadline, adding that the country's rubber-stamp parliament had already passed a new bill giving greater powers to harbor and labor officials to monitor trawlers.

But the bill will not become law for another 60 days, something Petipong said the junta might need to fast-track.

"I think we can beat the 180-day deadline," he said.

Thailand's junta, which took over last May in a coup and has vowed to kick-start the flagging economy, has said it is determined to combat illegal fishing through a plan that includes the installation of GPS devices on fishing vessels.

Thailand's fishing industry accounts for 40 percent of the country's food exports and is a mainstay of the economy. Its prawn industry is the world's largest.

But its image has been battered by allegations of human trafficking and slave labor, as well as taking illegal catches - practices critics say successive governments have turned a blind eye to.

Hlaing Min, an escaped migrant fisherman, begged the US for help.

"Basically, we are slaves - and slavery is the only word that I can find - but our condition is worse than slavery," he said. "On behalf of all the fishermen here, I request to the congressmen that the US stop buying all fish from Thailand. ... This fish, we caught it with our blood and sweat, but we don't get a single benefit from it."

In June, the US State Department downgraded Thailand to its lowest ranking in a report on human trafficking. The report highlighted abuses in the fisheries industry and elsewhere.

On Wednesday, the United States Congress is scheduled to hold a hearing on how to deal with Thailand and labor abuse, in light of an Associated Press investigation that found hundreds of men beaten, starved, forced to work with little or no pay and even held in cages at the remote island village of Benjina.

AFP - AP

(China Daily 04/23/2015 page11)