Binh Thuan ramps up efforts to combat IUU fishing

The People’s Committee of Binh Thuan on June 10 held a meeting with localities to implement solutions to combat illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing in the south-central province.

According to a report from the provincial Department of Agriculture and Rural Development, functional agencies continue to deploy measures to prevent fishing vessels from infringing on foreign waters. Therefore, 84 fishing boats at "high risk" are being monitored and 4,184 boat owners and captains have signed a commitment in this regard.

Staff have been arranged to be on duty around the clock to detect and handle fishing vessels that disconnect or encroach foreign waters via the VMS monitoring system.

Nguyen Van Chien, the department’s deputy director, said that the province currently has 8,450 fishing boats with a length of at least 6m, including 2,515 that are defined as "3 Nos" vessels (no registration, no examination, no licence).

The Department of Fisheries has granted temporary registration to 2,348 such vessels, he added.

To date, the installation of a vessel monitoring system (VMS) device has been made on almost all of the vessels. The provincial Fishing Port Management Board have made records of fishing vessels leaving and entering ports and exiting the port, monitoring output and traceability in line with regulations.

Participants at the meeting talked about difficulties in combating IUU fishing.

Although infringement of foreign waters in the province has been initially prevented, risks still remain, they said, elaborating that fishing vessels disconnecting their VMS while operating at sea is common and violations have not been strictly dealt with.

Nguyen Hong Hai, Vice Chairman of the provincial People's Committee requested units to focus resources on overcoming shortcomings in the management and control of fisheries activities in the locality and strictly monitor vessels with high risks of violating foreign waters to prevent any recurrence.

They were urged to focus on communication work, persuading fishing vessel owners and enterprises that engage in seafood purchasing, processing and export to strictly comply with legal regulations on combating IUU fishing and denounce acts that show signs of IUU violations.