Fisheries-Led Development in the South Pacific: Charting a 'Pacific Way' to a Sustainable Future

Abstract

Considerable debate surrounds the appropriate mix of policies to drive fishing-led development among developing nations in the South Pacific. While South Small Island States have since the 1970s been committed to a policy of tuna-industry domestication, serious doubts have emerged as to whether it can deliver any meaningful improvements to the well-being of peoples. An alternative approach has been suggested by development economists which would see Island nations largely abandon direct involvement in the industry and return to collective efforts to secure reasonable access fees from distant water fishing nations that take the majority of the region's tuna catches. This article argues that one reason that this policy-shift has not been taken up by capitals is that tuna-industry domestication policies remain bound-up within the influential discourse of resource nationalism. It is contended that any movement towards a more environmentally and developmentally sustainable ocean fisheries policy will require close engagement and transformation of this sovereignty-focussed narrative in a way that retains its attributes as a distinctive Pacific Way for the achievement of economic and social development.