China Dominates 44% of Visible Fishing Activity Worldwide
A new Oceana analysis reveals the global scale of China’s visible fishing fleet
Press Release Date: June 5, 2025
Location: Washington, DC
Contact:
Megan Jordan | email: mjordan@oceana.org
Megan Jordan
Today, on the International Day for the Fight Against Illegal, Unreported, and Unregulated Fishing, Oceana released an analysis of China’s global fishing* activity worldwide between 2022 and 2024. The analysis shows China’s global fishing footprint, in which 57,000 of their industrial fishing vessels dominated 44% of the world’s visible fishing activity during this period.
“To protect our oceans and fisheries, we must know who is fishing and where,” said Dr. Max Valentine, illegal fishing and transparency campaign director and senior scientist at Oceana. “It is critical that we have eyes on the seas, paying close attention to the world’s largest fishing fleets, especially from China, which have been linked to illegal, unreported, and unregulated fishing and human rights abuses at sea. The sheer scale of China’s distant-water fleet has a profound impact on marine ecosystems worldwide. Transparency at sea is essential, not just to track distant-water fleets, but to hold bad actors accountable, protect vulnerable communities, and safeguard the sustainability of our ocean for future generations.”
Some key takeaways from Oceana’s analysis of China’s apparent fishing activity over a three-year period, from Jan. 1, 2022, to Dec. 31, 2024:
- 57,000 fishing vessels, primarily trawlers, flagged to China appeared to fish for more than 110 million hours,
- China’s fishing vessels appeared to conduct 44% of the global fishing activity during this period,
- Chinese vessels accounted for 30% of all fishing activity on the high seas, appearing to fish for more than 8.3 million hours,
- China’s fishing vessels were most active in South Korea (11.8 million hours), Taiwan (4.4 million hours), Japan (1.5 million hours), Kiribati (almost 425,000 hours), and Papua New Guinea (over 415,000 hours),
- China appeared to fish in more than 90 countries’ waters for more than 22 million hours.
Increased transparency in global fisheries is critical. Oceana calls on governments to require vessel monitoring for both their fishing fleets and vessels they authorize to fish in their waters.
The analysis used data from Global Fishing Watch** (GFW) — an independent nonprofit founded by Oceana in partnership with Google and SkyTruth. Notably, the analysis reflects only a partial view of China’s fishing activities during this time, as it includes only those vessels flagged to China and transmitting automatic identification system (AIS) data, making them “visible” to public tracking systems.
Background
Illegal, unreported, and unregulated (IUU) fishing is a low-risk, high-reward activity, especially on the high seas where a fragmented legal framework and lack of effective enforcement allow it to thrive. IUU fishing can include fishing without authorization, ignoring catch limits, operating in closed or protected areas, targeting protected wildlife, and fishing with prohibited gear. These illicit activities can destroy important ocean habitat, severely deplete fish populations, and threaten global food security. These actions not only contribute to overfishing, but also give illegal fishers an unfair advantage over those who play by the rules.
Oceana released the results of a nationwide poll in 2024, which found that American voters overwhelmingly support transparency and traceability in the seafood supply chain. Included among the key findings, 90% of voters agree that imported seafood should be held to the same standards as U.S. caught seafood. Additionally, 91% of voters agree that seafood caught using human trafficking and slave labor should NOT be bought or sold in the U.S. Eighty-five percent of voters agree that all seafood should be traceable from the fishing boat to the dinner plate, and 88% say consumers should be reassured that the seafood they purchase was legally caught. Oceana’s poll, conducted by the nonpartisan polling company Ipsos using the probability-based KnowledgePanel®, surveyed 1,053 registered U.S. voters from June 28 to 30, 2024.
Read more about Oceana’s campaign here.
*Any and all references to “fishing” should be understood in the context of Global Fishing Watch’s (GFW) fishing detection algorithm, which is a best effort to determine “apparent fishing effort” based on vessel speed and direction data from the automatic identification system (AIS) collected via satellites and terrestrial receivers. As AIS data varies in completeness, accuracy, and quality, and the fishing detection algorithm is a statistical estimate of apparent fishing activity, it is possible that some fishing effort is not identified and, conversely, that some fishing effort identified is not fishing. For these reasons, GFW qualifies all designations of vessel fishing effort, including synonyms of the term “fishing effort,” such as “fishing” or “fishing activity,” as “apparent” rather than certain. Any/all GFW information about “apparent fishing effort” should be considered an estimate and must be relied upon solely at your own risk. GFW is taking steps to make sure fishing effort designations are as accurate as possible. All references to EEZ boundaries and sovereignty are based solely off the Marine Regions “World EEZ v12” definitions.
**Global Fishing Watch, a provider of open data for use in this analysis, is an international nonprofit organization dedicated to advancing ocean governance through increased transparency of human activity at sea. The views and opinions expressed in this press release and fact sheet are those of the authors, which are not connected with or sponsored, endorsed or granted official status by Global Fishing Watch. By creating and publicly sharing map visualizations, data and analysis tools, Global Fishing Watch aims to enable scientific research and transform the way our ocean is managed. Global Fishing Watch’s public data was used in the production of this fact sheet.
