During the past two years, the international fisheries community has achieved many important developments: the International Plan of Action on Illegal, Unregulated and Unreported fishing was adopted by FAO members during the first months of 2001; in October of the same year, the Reykjavik Conference on Responsible Fisheries in the Marine Ecosystem called on the world community to promote an effective ecosystems framework for fisheries management; in November 2001, the World Trade Organization's (WTO's) Ministerial Conference in Doha paid special attention to fisheries subsidies and decided that participants in the next round of trade negotiations should aim to clarify and improve WTO disciplines on such subsidies, taking into account the importance of this sector to developing countries; at about the same time, the UN Fish Stocks Agreement came into force; and, in September 2002, the World Summit for Sustainable Development (WSSD) adopted a Plan of Implementation that is clearly focused on improving the sustainability of world fisheries. Aquaculture has received increasing attention during the past two years, as illustrated by the fact that the world's first inter-governmental body to specialize in this field, the Sub-Committee on Aquaculture of the FAO Committee on Fisheries, met in Beijing in the spring of 2002.