This circular analyses the implementation and the impact of the FAO Code of Conduct for Responsible Fisheries since 1995. In doing so, it first establishes a picture of fisheries and aquaculture sectors before the publication of the Code and 13 years after, in order to detect major changes in both sectors. While fundamental changes in the fisheries sector remained few, the aquaculture sector displays a rather important degree of change, where practices in farm management and environmental management, amongst others, seem to have undergone broad and significant improvements. 

The document bases its analysis on country-level implementation of Code principles and provisions, and then looks into how various sector related players have endorsed and adopted the Code, and contributed to its implementation. This analysis shows that in many domains, implementation of the Code has been slow on the ground, but that in some domains, such as the implementation of the International Plan of Action to Prevent, Deter and Eliminate Illegal, Unreported and Unregulated Fishing (IPOA-IUU), countries have been fast to embrace the Code and implement its instrument in the ways prescribed. The study also shows that a very vast and diverse range of sector stakeholders across the entire spectrum have endorsed the Code and do pursue its stated objectives. 

The key impacts of the Code relate to its broad-based endorsement, and the ways in which it has shaped policies, legal and management frameworks worldwide, as a universally applicable international policy instrument, and how it has brought across into the fisheries domain the key principles of sustainable and responsible development inherent to the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) and its Agenda 21. The Code has been a facilitator of change towards more responsible and more sustainable approaches, but quantifying these, and relating them directly and primarily to the Code is not something that would appear reasonable. However, advances in domains such as combating IUU fishing have been Code-driven to a noticeable extent.

Hosch, G. Analysis of the implementation and impact of the FAO Code of Conduct for Responsible Fisheries since 1995. FAO Fisheries and Aquaculture Circular. No. 1038. Rome, FAO. 2009. 99p.