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African artisanal fishing is in crisis. It's not a metaphor. — This is a reality documented by FAO, Greenpeace and dozens of field studies. African waters are systematically looted by foreign fleets — Chinese, European, Russian — under opaque bilateral agreements that enrich political elites to the detriment of coastal communities. This dilemma is not fictional: it is lived every day by hundreds of thousands of artisanal fishermen.
The Faustian Development Agreement
The supply of the factory is classic: the destruction of a lifestyle is compensated by jobs in the industry which causes this destruction. It is the same mechanism as in mining extractivism, in agrobusiness, in deforestation. Communities lose their economic and cultural autonomy, and in exchange receive a wage dependency on businesses that can close overnight.
Organized resistance as a real alternative
In Senegal, collectives such as the Platform of Handicrafted Fisheries Actors have achieved concrete results: cancellation of some abusive fisheries agreements, establishment of protected fishing areas, international scrutiny. Organized resistance is not idealism — It's politics.
The sea as a common intergenerational good
The sea belongs to no one. It belongs to all — including future generations. To accept his destruction for immediate jobs is to sell the future of his grandchildren to pay for his sons' present. Intergenerational accounting is rarely done in these negotiations.
This dilemma calls for a fundamental question: when common resources are at stake, who has the right to negotiate? And who pays when the negotiation fails?
