A Vietnamese fishing vessel (Photo: VNA) The site wrote that almost five years after the EC’s warning, Vietnam has been actively focusing on drastic actions following the commission’s recommendations and regulations on IUU fishing in order to remove the warning as soon as possible.
The country has reviewed and supplemented legal documents and enhancing sanctions in the revised Fisheries Law, documents, and action plans of the government. In the last online meeting between Vietnam and the EC in November 2021, EC officials appreciated the changes in terms of legal matters, one of the four key recommendations made by the EC to Vietnam to solve IUU fishing.
Besides, Vietnam has applied information technology and digital transformation in traceability, towards ensuring digitalisation of professional procedures for monitoring and supervising aquatic products throughout value chain in a manner suitable with domestic and international consumption demands.
The site, however, noted that Vietnam is facing many difficulties to be delisted from the group of “warned countries”. Among of them are the monitoring of fishing vessels in the recent years due to the resurgence of COVID-19, and the number of fishing vessels still remained high.
Vietnam should learn experience of its neighbour, Thailand, which had a “yellow card” removed in 2019 after four years, it wrote, adding that the nation can carry out reform in the legal system, invest in the Monitoring, Control and Surveillance (MCS) system, and further cooperate with Regional Fisheries Management Organisations and neighbouring countries./.
VNA
