Bac Lieu (VNA) – The Mekong Delta province of Bac Lieu considers combating illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing as an urgent, important and long-term task to ensure the sustainable development of its fishery industry, Chairman of the provincial People’s Committee Pham Van Thieu has said.
Addressing a conference on July 18, the official underlined the need to drastically put in place harmonious measures, thus creating livelihoods and jobs for local residents, protecting fishery resources, preserving biodiversity, and raising public awareness against IUU fishing.
All-level agencies and localities must be more proactive, show higher determination, and urgently address existing shortcomings and limitations, towards having the European Commission’s “yellow card” against Vietnamese seafood lifted, he said.
According to Director of the provincial Department of Agriculture and Rural Development Luu Hoang Ly, in recent years, the locality has maintained strict inspections and control of fishing vessels entering and exiting ports as well as operating at sea, and strictly handled those that do not have enough documents, communication equipment, and maritime safety devices, as well as unregistered fishing boats and those without the vessel monitoring system (VMS).
The province has so far had all of its fishing vessels of 15m long and above equipped with the VMS, he reported.
The department has also announced and regularly updated the list of fishing vessels at risk of violating fishing regulations to serve coordination in the inspection and supervision work.
In the coming time, the local agricultural sector will coordinate with relevant agencies and units to concentrate resources on monitoring, controlling, and managing fishing vessels’ operation, supervising aquatic catch and traceability, and stepping up penalties against violating vessels.
It will launch a seafood traceability software system and an electronic fishing logbook to control fishing vessels and seafood quality at ports, and issue certificates of product origin in line with regulations./.
