Philippines’ fight against illegal fishing improves

The Philippines improved one spot to 54^th out of 152 coastal countries (from worst to best) in the 2025 edition of the biennial Illegal, Unreported and Unregulated (IUU) Fishing Index by the Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime. This put the Philippines as the fourth best performing country among its peers in Asia. With scores ranging from 1 to 5, where 1 is best, the Philippines had an overall score of 2.34, worse than the world average of 2.27, but better than Asia’s overall score of 2.55. The index assesses the likelihood that countries are exposed to and effectively combat IUU fishing.