It has taken dire threats of foreign trade sanctions to shake Thailand up over this horror story. We must respond quickly
Given that Thailand’s commercial fishing industry generates Bt30 billion annually, we would think that the authorities and those directly involved would do more to protect this precious source of revenue.
And yet they have long turned a blind eye to violations of human rights and even worse practices plaguing this slavery-like industry. Only now, with foreign governments threatening severe sanctions against Thailand unless the abuses stop, are the authorities beginning to act. And only now is the wider Thai public becoming fully aware of the severity of the wrongdoing.
It’s clear now that fisheries owners and boat skippers have been taking disgraceful advantage of their employees as a way to cut production costs. Foreign governments and rights organisations have thoroughly documented the abuses heaped on the lowly employees who man the nets and toil in the processing plants in Thailand, whom they describe as modern-day slaves.
It’s an awful situation, and all of us – from the biggest corporation, to the border guard ignoring the trafficking of people from neighbouring countries, to the consumer at the dinner table – must share responsibility for it. The consequences for not doing so will be grave.
“As has been reported for years, the Thai fishing industry is rife with forced labour, both on the high seas and within seafood-processing and -packing plants,” Mark Lagon, former State Department ambassador for trafficking in persons, told a US House Foreign Affairs subcommittee this week.
The White House is already authorised to impose sanctions that would bar Thai seafood from the US market.
Last month Thailand’s Channel 3 and the Associated Press both reported on hundreds of fishermen who Thai skippers confined in cages on the Indonesian island of Benjina. The fishermen related that they had often been beaten by their supervisors and had worked at sea for years for little or no pay.
The government has sent C130 cargo plane to rescue them, but much more must be done if Thailand is to win back the support of major buyers in the US, Europe and elsewhere.
AP identified one of the fishermen rescued earlier from Benjina as Hlaing Min, 32, a Myanmar national. “I want to tell the [US Congress] that, if I were to count all the skulls and bones from the fishermen who died, the sea would be full of Burmese bones,” he was quoted as saying. “On behalf of all the fishermen here, I request that the US stop buying all fish from Thailand.”
Hlaing Min and others who have found themselves in such a dire situation have the right to be bitter.
Bangkok policy-makers are debating the use of the controversial Section 44 of the interim constitution to improve the heinous state of the fishing industry. Section 44 deals directly with corruption, which is seen as the underlying problem in the abuse of fishing-industry workers.
Until the government takes bold action, Thailand stands accused of illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing, which threatens to draw severe trade sanctions from the US and the European Union.
Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha has placed the issue high on the national agenda, but we anxiously wait to see whether the actions taken will be enough to satisfy foreign observers.
Agriculture and Cooperatives Minister Pitipong Phuengboon Na Ayudhaya has admitted that Thailand lacks adequate legislation to address the caging of fishermen in Indonesia, there being no punishment on the law books for those who act illegally beyond the country’s territorial waters. The loophole, he said, underscores “Thailand’s irresponsibility to the international community”.
Closing the loophole will be a sound first step. There is much more to accomplish beyond that.
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