BTO-That was one of the drastic directions of Vice Chairman of the Provincial People's Committee Nguyen Hong Hai at the online meeting of the Steering Committee against illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing (IUU) on the morning of June 10.
The meeting was attended by representatives of leaders of agencies that are members of the Provincial Steering Committee for Combating IUU Fishing, representatives of a number of seafood exporting enterprises to the European market and connecting points in districts, towns and cities.
At the meeting, Deputy Director of the Department of Agriculture and Rural Development Nguyen Van Chien quickly reported on the implementation of IUU fishing prevention and control in the province in recent times.
Accordingly, from the beginning of 2024 until now, the Provincial People's Committee continues to focus on combating IUU fishing, preparing to work with the EC for the 5th time (expected in October 2024). In particular, the focus is on reviewing and counting "3 no" fishing vessels in the province, implementing temporary registration for management and control before the Circular amending and supplementing Circular No. 23/2018/TT-BNNPTNT dated November 15, 2018 of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development takes effect.
At the same time, focus on key tasks such as monitoring and controlling high-risk fishing vessels, promptly preventing fishing vessels from violating foreign waters; managing fleets, monitoring and controlling fishing vessel activities; controlling and preventing IUU fishing at ports, confirming, certifying and tracing the origin of exploited aquatic products and strengthening law enforcement and handling violations. In addition, departments, branches, units and localities have made initial efforts to prevent and end the situation of fishing vessels and fishermen in the province illegally violating foreign waters. Complete 100% of the installation of VMS equipment for fishing vessels in operation...
At the meeting, representatives of localities raised the difficulties they are facing such as: although the province has completed the statistics, classification, and screening of "3 no" fishing vessels, the number of new vessels is still high (135 new vessels compared to the temporary registration time in March 2024 (2,380 vessels) and an increase of 647 vessels compared to December 2023 (1,868 vessels)...
In addition, members of the provincial IUU Steering Committee also raised many opinions related to the number of fishing vessels that have stopped operating, are on shore (over 15m) and have not installed a journey monitoring device, but have not been able to be removed from the list. There are still cases of fishing vessels frequently losing connection to VMS in border waters, fishing vessels that frequently operate, depart from ports outside the province, especially fishing vessels under 15m, not subject to the requirement to install VMS equipment, but there is no mechanism to handle it...
Concluding the meeting, the Vice Chairman of the Provincial People's Committee emphasized that from now until October 2024, the situation of fishing boats and fishermen violating foreign waters must be put to an end. Localities must have a firm grasp of the area, manage high-risk fleets, handle and punish strictly, and have no prohibited areas. The agricultural sector needs to coordinate with the police force to have more effective reminder and deterrence measures. In addition, the Department of Agriculture and Rural Development is required to complete the review and registration of "3 no" vessels in September 2024; and must clean up data on vessels over 15m that have not installed VMS equipment.
For the group of vessels from 12 - 15m that have not been registered and inspected, it is necessary to implement solutions in parallel, consult the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, learn from other provinces and meet with relevant departments and branches, and advise the Provincial People's Committee if there are any problems. Mr. Nguyen Hong Hai requested to urgently carry out procedures to urgently dredge the La Gi estuary, especially environmental sanitation and infrastructure work at La Gi fishing port, at the same time organize surveys, make plans and propose to arrange economic career funds to dredge and maintain fishing port channels, fishing boat storm shelters, etc.
As for fishing vessels that lose VMS connection for 6 hours/10 days continuously and regularly, this group of vessels should be put in the high-risk group, monitoring should be increased and transferred to the police force for monitoring.
In particular, the Vice Chairman of the Provincial People's Committee requested the Department of Agriculture and Rural Development, based on the conclusion of the Inspection Team of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, to issue a plan with specific solutions to overcome each task, and complete it early in August. Advise the Provincial People's Committee to lead and direct local departments and branches to effectively and responsibly implement the work of combating IUU fishing. In particular, assign responsibility to the Chairman of the District People's Committee if there are more "3 no" ships. This is the basis and fundamental data for the agricultural sector to manage the fleet more easily in the coming time, contributing to the whole country removing the EC "Yellow Card".
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