Fishing boats arrive at the Tho Quang fishing port, Da Nang. (Photo: nhandan.vn)Hanoi (VNA) - Communications campaigns raising fishermen’sawareness about the Law on Fisheries and the fight against illegal, unreported,and unregulated (IUU) fishing are considered the leading measure in Vietnamesecoastal localities’ effort to get the European Commission (EC)'s “yellow card”warning to be removed soon.
The central province of Nghe An, which has so far issued itsaction plan to carry out the anti-IUU project toward 2025, has worked to renewcommunications work and expand its reach to each fishermen and ship owner. Localitieshave used vivid images, videos and specific examples of IUU fishing behavioursto help people easily understand, properly perceive, and strictly abide by theregulations when fishing at sea.
Meanwhile, in the Mekong Delta of Kien Giang, a total of 236law communications sessions took place since the beginning of this year,benefiting more than 12,900 fishermen. The local authorities also handed over 11,200anti-IUU fishing fliers and over 1,300 national flags to the group.
In Da Nang, Son Tra district, which houses the central city’s largest number offishing vessels, has established 71 solidarity production groups at sea and coordinatedwith agencies and units to provide fishermen with the Party'sguidelines, policies and laws related to them.
Vessels docks at a fishing port in Sam Son city, Thanh Hoa province. (Source: nhandan.vn)An inspection team from the European Commission (EC) willvisit Vietnam to examine the country’s efforts on IUU fishing prevention andcontrol in October instead of May as it announced earlier. The EC suggested theorganisation of online working sessions with Vietnamese authorities in May, Juneand October before sending the team to Vietnam.
In late May, a MARD delegation will have in-person workingsessions with EC representatives to update them on Vietnam’s achievements inIUU fishing prevention and control with the hope of narrowing the EC’srecommendations to Vietnam.
Since the EC’s inspection in last October, Vietnam hasworked hard to implement four groups of the EC’s recommendations on IUU fishingprevention and control, including those on legal framework; fishing vesselmonitoring and control, and fleet management; seafood output verification andorigin traceability; and law enforcement./.
