Provincial People's Committee held a meeting to assess the situation of IUU fishing in the province.

On the afternoon of December 2, the Provincial People's Committee held an online meeting to assess the implementation of solutions to prevent and combat illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing (IUU fishing) in the province. Comrade Nghiem Xuan Cuong, Vice Chairman of the Provincial People's Committee, Head of the IUU Steering Committee of Quang Ninh province, chaired the meeting.

Comrade Nghiem Xuan Cuong, Vice Chairman of the Provincial People's Committee, gave a speech at the meeting.

According to the report of the Department of Agriculture and Rural Development, as of October 30, 2024, there were a total of 5,556 fishing vessels in the province. The rate of fishing vessels updating citizen identification data/ID cards on the VNFISHBASE system at the provincial level reached 100%; at the district level, it only reached 49.5%, of which Quang Yen, Van Don, Ha Long, Dam Ha, and Co To have not yet completed.

Regarding the current status of fishing vessel management through VMS equipment, as of December 2, 2024, the whole province had 257 fishing vessels with a length of 15 meters or more operating offshore that had installed VMS equipment, reaching 100%. However, since the beginning of the year, there have been cases of fishing vessels onshore losing VMS connection for 6 hours or at sea losing connection multiple times from 6 hours to less than 10 days. The Department of Agriculture and Rural Development has detected and handled 5 fishing vessels with a length of 15 meters to less than 24 meters that did not maintain VMS operation during fishing at sea, revoking the right to use the fishing vessel captain's certificate from 03 months to 06 months. Advise the Provincial People's Committee to fine 1 fishing vessel with a length of 24 meters or more that did not comply with regulations in case the voyage monitoring device was broken or did not transmit information and data from the fishing vessel to the Fishing Vessel Monitoring Data Center while operating at sea with the amount of 203 million VND, and revoke the right to use the fishing vessel captain's certificate for 9 months.

At the meeting, representatives of departments, branches and localities discussed and clarified the shortcomings in the compliance with IUU regulations of Quang Ninh fishing vessels in aquatic and seafood exploitation activities and proposed solutions to strictly inspect and control fishing vessels during their operations at sea.

Representatives of departments, branches and localities discussed at the meeting.

To drastically prevent IUU fishing in the province in the coming time, Mr. Nghiem Xuan Cuong, Vice Chairman of the Provincial People's Committee, requested departments, branches and localities to closely follow the Prime Minister's directives on combating IUU fishing to implement. Urgently review and classify, thoroughly handle 3-no fishing vessels; continue to increase human resources to thoroughly review and implement the management, inspection and verification of fishing vessels operating in the sea, especially the loss of connection during the exploitation process; focus on increasing forces to grasp the situation in the area, propagate, detect early and remotely fishing vessels operating illegally in the sea.

In particular, departments, branches and localities need to continue to synchronously implement key solutions to closely monitor the area and have measures to deter and strictly handle violations. Localities should strengthen management and grasp the situation of fishing vessels in the area and be responsible to the Provincial People's Committee for violations related to fishing vessels (if any). At the same time, the provincial authorities should grasp the situation, coordinate to strictly monitor fishing vessels of Quang Ninh and, depending on the violation, handle it according to the law to effectively implement measures to prevent and combat illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing in the province.

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