In Chile, the National Fishing Service estimates that around 320,000 tons of marine resources are extracted illegally every year, and the most vulnerable species is hake. According to fishing authorities in the country, the small-scale sector is the number one offender, registering catches up to 4.5 times the authorized quotas.

However, illegal fishing doesn’t only come from the artisanal sector. An estimated 120,000 to 150,000 tons of anchoveta are captured but never registered in Peru every year for the illegal production of fish flour, either by authorized companies or illegal processing plants.

Estimates of how much money illegal fishing produces are based on deduction. The price of shark fin is about $650 per kilogram, or about $300 per pound. If the Chinese ship seized in 2017 in the Galápagos marine reserve was carrying 300 tons of shark and the fin is 5 percent of an average shark’s weight, then the ship was probably carrying around 15 tons of shark fins. That’s worth almost $10 million, just in a single haul.

The irregular and secretive nature of illegal fishing makes it impossible to ascertain the real figures. Moreover, the countries often lack the resources and equipment to monitor fishing activities adequately or to measure the existing biomass of various fisheries.

Weak governance

Controlling illegal fishing would decrease the overexploitation of resources, but there is a consensus that the fundamental problem lies in weak governance.

In the case of Peru, the management of marine landscapes is complex, with numerous public institutions involved. In spite of the advances in inter-institutional cooperation, fishing policies still take a sectoral approach instead of an ecosystemic one. “The separation of responsibilities among the different local, regional and national authorities is not clear,” said Pedro Solano of the Peruvian Society of Environmental Law.