"Thai junta takes the stench off troubled fisheries industry", 18 December 2018

If all goes according to plan, Thailand will become the first Asian nation to ratify the International Labor Organization's Convention on Work in Fishing ahead of general elections....

...The ratification will mark the culmination of four years of tackling endemic problems in the nation's fisheries sector, an industry plagued for years by widespread human rights abuses, trafficking in migrant laborers and unsustainable practices that have contributed to the depletion of the region's fish stock.

...[T]here are signs that Thai fisheries could be a hot topic on the campaign trail....

...Slave-like conditions endured by migrant laborers aboard Thai fishing vessels were exposed in investigative reports....

...To its credit, Prayut's military regime responded to the downgrades fairly quickly.

Although still yellow carded by the EU, Thailand moved up from Tier 3 to Tier 2 in the 2018 TIP report. What is needed now is for other Southeast Asian countries to follow Thailand's lead, industry observers say.

"Thailand is in the lead with the ratification and with establishing a system of inspectors," said the ILO's Judd. "But after some point it becomes a comparative disadvantage if Thailand is making changes to the industry to raise standards but the competition isn't."