Regional Fisheries Management in the East China Sea

China, Japan and the Republic of Korea (ROK) have shelved their efforts to reach bilateral agreements on the delimitation of their exclusive fishery zones (EFZs) and commenced their talks on the provisional regime on fisheries. The Southern Provisional Zone established by the 1998 Fisheries Agreement between Japan and the Republic of Korea is located almost completely within the Intermediate Zone of Japan and China. Three bilateral agreements are provided for the conservation and management of fishery resources in the Sea. Because of the fact that the agreements were concluded independently from each other, they have created at least five overlapping zones in the Sea. The northern part of the East China Sea is a unique area of conflicting bilateral regimes on fisheries adopted one after another in the late 1990s and brought into force between 1999 and 2001, with a supplementary arrangement added in 2000 by China and Japan. Keywords: East China sea; fisheries agreement; Japan; regional fisheries management; Republic of Korea (ROK); southern provisional zone