What does it mean, really? Let us be clear: the MSC suspension does not reflect an issue related to illegal, unreported or unregulated (IUU) fishing at an individual fishery level. No one has overfished their allocated quota. However, as the three stocks are shared by a number of individual countries, inter-governmental measures are indispensable. In this case, just as in the case of mackerel, the lack of agreement on the allocation of quota between the coastal states has resulted in autonomous quotas to be set. Indeed, intergovernmental negotiations had failed to ensure that quotas did not exceed the advice of the International Council for the Exploration of the Sea (ICES) at a global level.